


We Who Endure (in Perpetuity)

by fluffykomodo (god_is_undead)



Series: A Distant Star [2]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015), Star Wars Original Trilogy, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Additional Warnings In Author's Note, Brendol Hux is super proud of his creepy junta, Canon-Typical Violence, Dubious Ethics, Dubious Morality, Dude is dead that wasn't, Ethics, Formerly Canon Compliant, History and politics and add a bit of fanaticism and suddenly you're there, Hux Backstory, I'm Bad At Tagging, I'm Sorry, Makes almost no difference though, More to be added as I think of them, Museums, One Shot Collection, Original Character(s), Politics, Slice of Life, Speciesism, You'll know why if I ever get around to finishing this story arc, bless my heart what fresh hell is this, but a vast minority of them, drug deal euphemisms, first order society, it's weird - Freeform, life in the first order, people living lives, shutting up now, the first order doesn't have a fucking personality and that's what fanfiction is for, war on the home front, well it's not like there's any canon on the FO in this sense to contradict, with an overarching theme, world building
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-05-25
Updated: 2018-02-25
Packaged: 2018-11-04 23:17:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 21,201
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11001066
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/god_is_undead/pseuds/fluffykomodo
Summary: The First Order is made of more than just ships; within its borders live people, and those people are as varied as anywhere else, under the surface. It is, in a word, a society.((Collection of disjointed fics/ficlets showing varied First Order/older Imperial perspectives, in a more or less chronological order. I have a fascination with slice of life, and apparently, that extends to hermitic space juntas. yay))Warning: sometimes canon doesn’t exist but legends does. I take some liberties





	1. Brendol Hux - 1

**Author's Note:**

> I have a sick fascination with slice of life and also with dystopian anything, so…here we fucking are. I'm not apologizing.
> 
> This chapter makes me nervous because of some of its content (which I feel needs some kind of disclaimer: WARNING: you're reading about an enthusiastic space fascist and the ideas contained herein cannot be assumed to reflect the ideas of the writer). I’ve never written Brendol Hux before and I’ve never read anything with him in it and I have no idea how he's usually portrayed, but he’s a fucking jackhole by all accounts—but instead of making him a complete psycho, let’s try and make him rational! Monsters are far scarier when they’re rational. Yaaay!

A curriculum.

He took that to mean a way of life.

That was what Brendol Hux had been tasked to create all those years ago: a pipeline that winnowed away the chaff and distilled the best qualities of the Empire into an efficient, capable core. If it were small, so much the better. The Empire had grown too ponderously large, the bureaucracy even after dissolution of the Senate remained too prolific of itself—

Too much a hulk in the way the Republic had been: layers on layers of uninspired functionaries tottering along on the precious notion that they were necessary. In very simple terms the Emperor had not gone far enough, fast enough, to ensure lasting order. He had allowed the Senate to go on mired in its own swampy morass, been too indulgent in appeasing the trappings of decentralized authority, those relics of the time before Senator Palpatine had been Emperor Palpatine.

Better to rip the bandage away fast. Let there be growing pains rather than the protracted easement Palpatine had taken great pains to mount when remaking the galaxy.

When he had been chosen, Brendol had known it was for what he brought to the table: his vision, his proven ability. While Commandant at Arkanis Academy he had created the Commandant’s Cadets, a group whose purpose had been to sow seeds of a tree whose roots would support an Empire that stood forever.

Asked to apply what he had pioneered on Arkanis on a larger scale, asked to be the fundamental impetus behind a great, lasting renascence—how could he possibly refuse?

Brendol had applied everything he knew of military conditioning to the task: it had to be firm, it had to have a solid ideological and rhetorical foundation, and it had to be consistent. The earlier the better, and if some did not make it, well, they were to be weeded out as undesirable. On Jakku, he had trained local orphans as bodyguards to Fleet Admiral Gallius Rax to prove this point.

Children were so malleable, they were ideal. The recruits on Arkanis came to him with identities, with parents, with names. Even the orphans had been someone before he trained them; in the days of the Emperor’s reign, his superior officers had, foolishly in Brendol's opinion, rejected the notion of raising Stormtroopers from birth in a similar fashion as the clone troopers had been, even though this had arguably produced the best-trained soldiers seen in millennia.

The First Order had no such qualms and quickly accepted his ideas.

It was absolutely key, after all, to lay foundational constants, to be the first source of comfort—and of punishment, and to be the very last word in both. Repetitive uniformity in ideological lockstep: the very keystone of truly effective conditioning, constantly reinforced.

Brendol had always been amused at the similarities between what was called _brainwashing_ and the means by which _breaking them down and building them up_ at military academies was achieved: the basic idea was to isolate an individual, imbalance them, deprive them of sleep, make them doubt what they know or feel aside from what you want them to know, and keep them on their toes. Into that void, train certain behaviors that produce a calm in the storm. He supposed that the difference boiled down to whether or not it was perceived that whatever one was being built back into was desirable.

The actual mechanism of tearing down-building up was more relevant with the older recruits he had trained on Arkanis. Isolation in a group of like-minded individuals, loud, dissonant, constant pressure; endless days and fleeting nights, but—

Brendol had noticed such techniques worked best on _willing_ recruits. There were always boys and girls in Arkanis who threw themselves into their training, body and soul, who wanted to be remade, believing in the Empire and the New Order, and believing that in so doing they turned themselves into the best kind of Imperial citizen.

So, obviously, it was important to foster as much willing vigorous support and spirit as possible in as many recruits as possible through whatever means available.

For the ones who would become Stormtroopers, a harsh training regimen in a strictly controlled environment from the earliest moment possible would produce obedient, effective soldiers.

For the other members of the First Order, a life raised in an environment where classroom curriculum and social landscape could be carefully managed was ideal. The flight to the Unknown Regions produced a more or less homogeneous and predisposed field for him to sow, and he had little trouble setting standard narrative rhetoric. Brendol had also encouraged the promulgation of and active engagement in First Order youth groups and athletic clubs, to reinforce the same, and in fact had gone so far as to ask that a branch of the home guard dedicate an office to investigating the political reliability of these organizations to ensure ideological uniformity.

All this to say, as far as the outcome, Brendol considered his efforts to be a rousing success.

As he watched the vaporizing remains of the Hosnian system fade in his holo, Brendol smiled to himself in triumph, proud that, regardless of the actual hands behind it, _he_ had made this happen. It was _his_ ideas put into practice which enabled the obliteration of the heart of the hated Republic.


	2. CPO Unamo - 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chief Petty Officer Unamo, on her career.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I forgot to mention in Ch 1; I had completely forgotten that an entity named the Home Guard existed during WWII in the UK. I was actually thinking of the Confederate Home Guard during the American Civil War when I named it. They’re relevant in books/movies like Cold Mountain. Sorry if that caught anyone up. Meh.

The day she made Chief was easily the proudest of Unamo’s life. Tall, severe, tight-lipped—she had heard snide whispers all her career: Unamo thinks she's Grand Moff Tarkin reborn, a few dozen rungs down the ladder and with tits.

 But Unamo had never let such idiocy bother her. She looked only ahead, and if she were to be compared to Tarkin, let it be for her effectiveness. Her strengths. She would think of it as a compliment.

 The day she made Chief may have been the proudest moment of her life; it was greeted with little more than a sniff by Mother.

  _“The Empire needs children, dear,”_ said the still-beautiful socialite through the _Finalizer_ ’s library's public-use holo, echoing that oft-repeated, pervasive truism, aging like fine wine as her pale skin grew thinner and her hair whitened above a colllar of red velvet. Mother fought the aging process with the tenacity of an entrenched army, though some enemies were inexorable and lines had stolen in around her mouth, creased at her brow. _“And you're getting up there in years, you know.”_

 Unamo had blinked, struck dumb for a moment. _Of course, it always goes back to this._

 How many different ways must Unamo say her place, her heart, was on the battlefield? Natalism was state policy and having children greatly incentivized, seen as a duty, but surely the First Order couldn't begrudge one woman her calling, not when every breath was in its service? She would be more effective against the Republic fighting, she was sure of it.

 Women had been in the Imperial military, of course, rare as they were, and the First Order had not sought to outright ban them. One had only to look no further than Grand Admiral Sloane for that to be obvious, though in the First Order, Unamo had faced considerable setbacks, derision—even been denied posts because the assumption was she would be pregnant halfway through. Even so, she had persevered: she was part of the _Finalizer_ ’s bridge crew.

Mother had not been military at all; she had only followed Father into the Unknown Regions. _A woman's place is with her husband_ , was all Mother would say about it, though the bitterness in her eyes was for the world the Republic had stolen, not exile.

 Barely fourteen when the Empire fell, Unamo vividly remembered the scene: while Coruscant redoubled the celebrations that had poured into the streets after Endor, security forces did not repeat their response after Jakku: rather than rounding up the traitors and shipping them away again, they simply stood aside and watched, anxiously, while Unamo and Mother hurried to pack something, anything—

 _“Hurry,”_ Mother had hissed, a frantic light in her blue eyes as she tipped a jewelry box into one of several bags. _“We must hurry!”_

 Still half a child, standing confused in the middle of the storm that used to be her family's mid-level flat on the upper levels of Coruscant (the day was unfairly nice), Unamo could only stamp her feet.

_“No! Why should we run? The Imperial fleet will--”_

_“No, dear. We've lost and the filth will be here soon. If we stay they'll take everything from us. We'll go and stay with your aunt for now, until your father contacts us again.”_

 Say one thing for Mother: she was quick to read the wind and faster to take an order. After the fall of the Empire, the security forces took a blind eye to looting and violence, as long as it was arguably against anything or anyone Imperial.

 They traveled with some of Mother's friends on their ship.

 For months, they didn't know where Father was. If he was alive or dead.

 Unamo spent those first months in a daze, angry and afraid. The New Republic, as it called itself, declared its establishment. The holos were full of bad and worse news. The Empire splintered into remnants ruled by warlords, holdouts fell. What had once seemed so secure was rapidly vanishing as if it had never been. The Galactic Concordance was signed a year later.

 And then, one day, Father had called them to the Unknown Regions: hyperspace coordinates for an unknown system in the frontier. Told Mother to bring their daughter and that he would be waiting for them.

 Their departure had been rather less rushed, the second time. Mother tried to convince Auntie to come; it ended in bad blood when she was refused.

 The three-day flight through hyperspace was fraught with tension that made them all quiet. The housekeeping droid that had looked over Unamo throughout her childhood was perhaps the only source of familiarity; this strange ship and Mother's friends offered none.

 It told her stories and didn't tell Mother about when Unamo clung to her, crying for a deep well of fear she could not name.

 Unamo first saw the planet from the viewport.

 _“Where are we?”_ she had asked, gazing bewilderedly at a strange green orb shot with blue water and layered with swirling white clouds. There were a handful of Imperial-class Star Destroyers in orbit, their white hulls blackened in places with battle wear, one completely without conning tower shield arrays, actively conducting flight operations, an assortment of smaller craft arcing in and out of atmo... 

 _“It's called Nall,”_ the tall, grizzled old man whose ship theirs was replied, his voice barely above a whisper.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I may or may not have written this on the elliptical. Eh, I have good balance. Writing is a surprisingly good time-muncher.
> 
> The actress that plays Unamo is in her 40’s, which I’m not changing, which means she’s old enough to remember the Empire in some fashion. We don’t get a whole hell of a lot on Unamo; most people seem to characterize her as the token frigid cunt. That’s kind of cruel; I think I read that there was a woman on a Star Destroyer in the OT, but they were in the background and I don’t recall exactly where, and I like people on all sides thinking and rational. So uh…here’s my version. The woman is a careerist, and to some people that makes her a frigid cunt.
> 
> Ps, modern ships today have libraries and ways to contact people not on board. So no, it's not weird that this is a thing.
> 
> Also, WHY is the endnote for the first chapter still showing up?


	3. Xamuel Lennox - 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Anybody remember Lennox? He’s the guy in ESB who literally has one line which is “Good. Our first catch of the day.” He’s canonically a very interesting character; honorable and conflicted and stays with the Empire as he views it as more politically legitimate than the Rebellion. Literally, his trading card says “hates politicking”. Willy nilly abuse of Legends material ahoy!
> 
> This is shaping up in my head to be a kind of multi-POV series of stories all generally focused around the same events, but showing multiple perspectives on it as it progresses towards an end that, yes, I do have in my head. Maybe I'm biting off more than I can chew, but we’ll see. There's a lot of ground to cover. It’s occurred to me that it’s probably not very entertaining so far in any normal sense, and probably seems scattered. Meh. Roll with it, I swear we'll get somewhere.
> 
> The whole point of this is background characters and behind the scenes. What I like is politics and history and people behaving like people. And people can have multiple interpretations of the same situation—and that’s what I’m playing with here—but please rest assured there is a story arc to be had here. Which kind of snuck the fuck up on me as I was writing on me, but there you go.

A red wound spread across the late afternoon sky, as if vacuum itself could be punctured and bleed. Xamuel Lennox could only gape, unknowing: _what is that?_

 The light quickly faded from view, as if it had never been, leaving Xamuel blinking, wondering if he had finally lost all grasp on reality, if he hadn't imagined the whole thing. He stood, hurrying into his son’s home where his nephew and son stood chatting over a pot of caf. He could hear the children in the other room, playing.

 His heart fluttered heavily in his chest and his breath was quick and shallow, though the outward reflection of his disquiet was dimmed: military bearing had been bred into him from a long string of ancestors, and been carried with him through years of service in the Imperial Navy until his capture at Endor, after which it carried him through two decades of imprisonment at the hands of the Republic.

 But his alarm wasn't invisible to those who knew him well, and besides, he was a bit out of practice.

 “What's wrong?” Milt asked, then followed his father as he rushed past, heedless of even the twinge in his hip, for the holo in the day room. His nephew Liram followed. “Dad, what's wrong?”

 Instincts. Something terrible was happening. At first, Xamuel’s stomach twisted, his thoughts reeled to the Death Star, that horrifying weapon first wielded by Grand Moff Tarkin against Jedha and then Alderaan as a whole, and its even more monstrous second iteration, never fully realized, which he had observed from the viewport of the _Tyrant_ , but...

 But the Empire was dead and buried and only the Republic themselves could have had the resources to build such a thing, which they wouldn’t. There was a closed shadow clinging to the edge of known space, the First Order, they called themselves, which he understood claimed to be something like the Empire-in-exile. Besides that, there were a handful of systems in Republic space which refused to align themselves. _Who could have_ …

 “Lunei, I need to use the holo, please,” he said gently to his youngest granddaughter, who blinked up at him with big brown eyes and smiled. She had been born shortly before he had been surprised with what the Republic termed a _compassionate release_ form prison.

 “Okay!” she replied brightly. “You can sit by me!”

 He adjusted the holo to the news programming he usually watched, only to frown in bewilderment when nothing appeared. There was only a dead signal, as if…

 He felt a bit lightheaded.

 “Dad, what is going on?” Milt’s voice had gone somewhat faint, deepened in tone. He was concerned.

 Xamuel checked the next three major news sources from the Hosnian system, the main source of widely accessible news on the public holo feed. Nothing.

 _No, no, no...it’s not possible_. It had to be a mistake. Somehow.

 “Dad, check Coruscanti news,” Milt suggested. “Maybe Hosnian Prime is having technical difficulties.”

 Xamuel did not flinch, he could not openly react to a comment quite so innocently tactless, particularly since he had nothing but his gut telling him to brace for impact. He switched to Coruscanti news.

 The galaxy fell out from under his feet in a whirlwind of speculative horror. The First Order had immediately announced that they claimed responsibility for the attack. A little film clip was shown of a recorded holo of a single, redheaded young man in black standing in front of ranks of Stormtroopers that were just different enough to be noticeable, a field of white and black and red, shouting…

Most people in Republic space thought little of that little rump state, if they thought of them at all...

 Xamuel certainly hadn't been converted by the Republic in the last thirty years, but he did share with them a low-grade condescension towards the First Order, if for slightly different reasons. Pretenders all, in a waking dream.

This was…this was something he didn’t know how to begin to process.

 And how did they do it? The Galactic Concordance had specifically forbidden the construction of…

 “Milt,” he said calmly, some of his old command in his voice, “Get the children out of here. They do not need to see this.”

 

* * *

 

 

Republic security operatives appeared at the door within the hour and Xamuel did his best to accommodate them despite the terrified anger in their faces and the nausea he struggled to keep in check.

 No, he had no idea what had happened before he turned on the holo. He saw the red plasma shine in the sky and turned the holo on to find out. No, he had never had any contact with the First Order, at any point.

 No, he had never contacted the only other known living commanding officer of the Death Squadron, who was known to intelligence groups to reside in First Order territory.

 “I haven't spoken to General Veers since just before the battle of Endor, almost thirty years ago,” Xamuel said calmly. If he acted out, if he gave these operatives—a young Togruta and a Devaronian—an excuse, they would clap him in stun cuffs and haul him away for firmer questioning.

 They may still do that, as fearful as this attack had made them. Xamuel had nothing to hide but he wasn’t insensitive to the notion that this attack would ramp up nerves quite exponentially.

 “You were commanding officer of the _Tyrant_ , weren't you?”

 “Yes, and General Veers was commanding officer of all ground forces in the Death Squadron. He had overall operational command over the ground forces stationed on my ship over myself in such matters, while I had administrative command over them. That does not mean we were frequently in close personal contact.” Xamuel had thought well of Veers’ effectiveness on the battlefield, and the man was one of the more honorable ones in the Imperial military so Xamuel had a rather positive outlook on the man overall, but he couldn't say they had ever been socially friendly. _I had no idea he_...

 The Togruta frowned and glanced at his colleague as he sat back. “I don't get it. If they were on your ship…”

 Xamuel looked between them, nonplussed. “The Republic’s own military also distinguishes between operational and administrative chains of command. An operational command chain is the ultimate word in operations. An administrative chain of command exists to...well, do paperwork.” The Rebellion had not, but the Rebellion had been far more idiosyncratic. By contrast Xamuel had had both administrative and operational command over the Naval personnel on his ship, and Admiral Piett presided over everyone in the Death Squadron in both senses with the sole exception of Darth Vader. “To be sure I had command over the ground forces stationed on my ship when the _Tyrant_ was operating on its own, but General Veers…”

 “They're gone,” the Devaronian hissed. “Most of the fleet was in orbit over Hosnian Prime!”

 “And the Resistance?”

 “They were the ones who blew up the Starkiller.”

 “Starkiller?”

 The Togruta elbowed his colleague sharply.

 Xamuel sighed. “Dare I ask why it was called Starkiller?”

 “Supposedly, that's what it fueled itself with. Stars.”

 Xamuel sat in appalled silence. It seemed utterly inconceivable that such a thing should be possible, and he didn’t know exactly what they meant by _fueled itself with_ stars or how that worked, but... _the Hosnian system is gone_.

 He also reflected on how utterly incautious they were being with information that would have been jealously guarded by the Empire if the situation were reversed.

 _Be fair. If the situation were reversed you would have been long dead in a hard labor camp_.

 “It...used stars?”

 “Yes. At least one star has completely disappeared from the galaxy, and…”

 “I see,” Xamuel said, though he did not.

 “So you wouldn't know anything about this thing?”

 “No,” he said, with sincere vehemence. “I merely looked up at the right moment, and…” He grimaced.

“Would you be willing to swear under oath to that?”

“Certainly,” he said. “Whatever is necessary.”

“You have never renounced the Empire.”

Xamuel had been wondering when they would get around to asking about this.

“Now you’re just harassing him,” Milt said shortly, from the doorway. He’d been surly ever since they arrived, lingering in the other room and peeping in every now and then.

“That’s enough,” Xamuel said firmly. “Go wait outside with Liram and the children.”

“But Dad—”

“ _Milten_.”

He departed with a last sour look at the two Republic operatives, muttering something about _those creatures_. Xamuel was sure he had never taught Milt to say anything like that, and kept a genteelly composed look on his face despite the twitch of irritation in his cheek.

“No, I have never renounced the Empire,” Xamuel agreed. “I have made no secret of that.”

“I know,” the Togruta said. “You’ve denounced specific actions by the Empire since their fall but you’ve never renounced your allegiance to it.”

“Should I renounce an allegiance to a government that no longer exists?” he replied evenly.

“The First Order claims to be the Empire. Its legitimate successor, anyway. A better version of it. What do you think about that?”

He snorted. “If only saying something could make it so.” He shifted his hands in his lap and proceeded. “After Endor and the death of the Emperor, what was called the Empire shattered into little more than a series of fiefs ruled by warlords. Jakku ended whatever unity had survived that decentralization. The First Order represents the remains of that and nothing more—I do not see them as the legitimate heir to the Empire. It is made up of elements that previously belonged to the Empire, but is largely a creation after the fact, thought up by fanatic opportunists.”

“So you don’t intend to go running back to them?”

“I was never part of the First Order to begin with,” Xamuel said plainly. “I can’t return to something I was never a part of.” He had spent the years since his release in quiet retirement, a strange curiosity to the locals on Chandrila. They had grown used to him, but he suspected that this attack on Hosnian Prime would do him no good in their eyes. Chandrila had once been the capital of the New Republic, before they had decided to rotate their capitals, and sentiments here ran high.

“And what are your thoughts on the Republic?” the Togruta asked.

Xamuel blinked, taken by surprise and a shade of discomfort, knowing that this was a minefield of a topic. _My thoughts? Various and sundry_. For all he rejected the First Order, he wasn’t convinced of the Republic, either, which was why he had never renounced the Empire (and never would). In one sense, he could accept that the Rebellion won the war. It was reality. In another, he still saw the Republic as a usurper government; during his service he had disdained of the corruption endemic in the system but accepted it at face value—he was content enough to serve in the Death Squadron precisely because he was absolved of the need to politic quite as much as elsewhere: Xamuel had never really taken any stock in the vicious rumors that Admiral Piett had actively schemed to remove Ozzel and take his place; the most precarious position in the entire Imperial military system didn’t seem like the job anyone would actively want to pursue—and in any case Piett had integrity while Ozzel was a pompous windbag.

 _I hardly think it matters, but I know they will not see it that way_. Xamuel could recognize when he was being canvassed as a potential risk.

“The New Republic was established by the Rebellion, which won the war.” They won—by right of the victor they had at least _de facto_ legitimacy. He could split hairs about continuity of state apparatus, and did—which the First Order in any case also violated. The fact was there was no one left in the galaxy whom Xamuel saw as completely legitimate.

“The New Republic reestablished democracy in the galaxy after democracy was destroyed by the Empire,” the Devaronian snapped.

 _And this new Republic is already shattering the same way the Empire did after Endor. Who knows if they will be able to hold on_.

Xamuel said nothing for a moment, holding his peace. This was an argument with no solution.

“Do you suspect I secretly applaud this atrocity?” he asked, bluntly. “Is that what we are really discussing?”

The pair glanced at each other. “Well, do you?” the Togruta asked.

“I do not,” he replied readily.

“And you say you have no knowledge of anything to do with the First Order, or had any contact with General Maximilian Veers?”

“None whatsoever. I am willing to sign a sworn affidavit on the matter.”

“I don’t believe that should be necessary,” the Togruta said, somehow shaken. He rose from the table and so did his Devaronian counterpart. Xamuel did as well. “Captain Lennox, please do not go anywhere without informing local law enforcement. We will be in contact with you soon.”

“Of course. Allow me to show you out.”

Once they were gone and Xamuel shut the door, he turned around to find Milt standing there in the foyer, staring at him in pain.

“They can’t just harass you like that without being hypocrites!” he said angrily. “After all they’ve said about how the Empire treated people. What was that about? Obviously you’re involved because you were with the Imperial Navy? Are they going to haul you off back to prison?”

Xamuel grimaced. “They did not harass me, Milt.”

“Yes, they did! It was the First Order who attacked the Hosnian system. Not you.”

“The First Order emerged from Imperial remnants.” He felt tired.

“It’s a cult that some old Imperials made up.”

“Yes, well…I do not see them as the Empire’s legitimate successors, whatever they say. Every warlord after Endor claimed to be legitimate.”

Milt stared at him. “I know that voice, Dad. What are you thinking?”

The First Order was a group of extremists who had taken what was most appalling about the Empire and distilled it. It had somehow created a weapon powerful enough to destroy an entire system at once, one which somehow powered itself by—killing stars?

The question he was forced to pose to himself was, what did he feel were his obligations? Did he even have any? He was an Imperial by self-admission, _still_ an Imperial as far as he was concerned.

Milt blanched. “You not actually thinking of getting involved in this war, are you?”

Xamuel’s stare was a shade severe. “And why shouldn’t I?”

“What are you going to do? Walk up to a Republic recruiting station and ask to enlist? Why would you want to do that? Even if they would take you, what are you going to _do?_ You’re almost seventy!”

“I fought against the Rebellion because I believed that, regardless of the problems with the Empire, it was legitimate and that the Rebellion chose to fight and use terror rather than legitimate means of dissent. I haven’t actually changed my mind on that, but this First Order…” Xamuel shrugged and was blunt. “They are not the Empire.”

Milt didn’t look convinced.

“Are you really thinking of actually getting involved?”

“I hadn’t thought of anything more than a couple of hours ago,” Xamuel said with a vaguely reproachful, vaguely thoughtful note. “But I may have to consider it.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So. Allons-y, where we finally are getting somefuckingwhere, if only starting to.
> 
> Ps, I get a little bit technical with the military shit in this chapter; if you're curious, yes, I do have military experience, so I'm not completely pulling it out of my ass.
> 
> PPs. Compassionate releases do exist. Typically for advanced age or medical reasons, they’re also given the phrasing ‘released on humanitarian grounds.’ Besides which, many Western European countries don’t believe in life terms in prisons, as opposed to the US.
> 
> PPPS, I didn’t fucking edit this. Shiiiit.
> 
> PPPPs, If you’re wondering why they’re calling Veers a General and not the bullshit demotion he got after Endor, well, Lennox was kind of out of the loop and literally didn’t get the memo, nor is the Republic likely to care about such things so…yeah.


	4. OC - 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You can get pretty much anything with the right contacts and enough money, because somebody always knows how to get places.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Long notes this time. Sorry not sorry because contextual importance and pleading my case? This fucking month can go burn in fucking hell. Seriously. I just turned in two (TWO!!!) papers late for the first time in my life. By a day, but still LATE. Ugh. This summer is being taken on the daily possibilities of the Build Your Own 6-Pack. 
> 
> But—  
> And now, as they say, for something completely different.  
> Light on the military aspects, heavier on the social element. (OR: do not read this chapter if you can’t stand OCs and a lot of talk about politics.) But I tried to do something original.
> 
> WARNINGWARNINGWARNING: Part of what is mentioned in this chapter is a bit in the weeds of I swear ***100% Wookipedia-certified canon*** backstory shit. I don’t think I’ve ever really seen mentioned the politics in the Republic described in the book series in fics before that I have ever seen, but I DID NOT MAKE IT UP. The complexity of New Republic politics is one of those things I rather suspect will become relevant in Episode 8, particularly with Manic Panic lady, which is annoying because why the fucking fuck was it not even given a PASSING nod in 7? 
> 
> What is being referenced are the Centrist and Populist factions within the Republic, from the Bloodlines book which has all the fucking backstory for TFA (which I never fucking read but thank fucking Lavos for Wookipedia). I make up as little as I can get away with. Put simply, the Centrists tend to feel positively in some shade towards qualities of the Imperial government (hence, Centrist); the Pluralists hedge closer to decentralized government. Super fun kay.  
> (Fun fact: Coruscant is, canonically, Centrist-aligned; for this I recall Isaac Asmiov’s Foundation trilogy when it mentioned a planet the Mule set up as a capital after it wasn’t anymore which goes to the effect that a planet/city never quite forgets that it was a capital. Also, great series. Loved it. Maybe not everyone’s cup of tea but it covers grand historical patterns…maybe that’s why I like it.)
> 
> The more I read Wookipedia to write this fic, in all honesty, for the record, I’m increasingly not fond of how poorly backstory information was conveyed in episode 7 (actually, not at fucking all). 7 was great, but 7 had its flaws (I’m aware they were consciously evoking episode 4, but…no, not elaborating, this note is going to turn into an essay and it’s already stupid long). I love politics (it’s pretty much history in the making, which I love in all its varied shades), and damn it, there’s better ways of showing such intricacies than putting it all in backstory novels! And if that’s not what the opening crawl is for, then what fucking IS it there for, to wax on about Luke (even if I do love the guy)?! Ep 4’s was general enough to give you a good idea of the overall political situation. Fuckssake. With a long running series like SW, there are two kinds of fans: the people that will read the books and the people who only watch the movies. Even if 8 does go back and fill us in, it still leaves 7 as a bit of a weird set-up aside.
> 
> But, I promised First Order society and First Order society you shall have. I wanted to wait on this chapter but this is the last fluffy bit and my last chance before the plot which snuck up on me (dear lord I really did just want disconnected one-shots…why…) kicks in; I’d planned Max’s chapter before this but he’s turning out to be a surprisingly difficult character for me to write, plus I reread Xamuel’s chapter and realized I’d kind of cornered myself. So here we are, lol. But I think I’ve sorted out those issues, and I should be less fucked than I have been for a little while. (And there was much rejoicing.)
> 
> “Half the deals I've ever done went down at Taco Cabeza!” – Jesse Pinkman

It was not more than a lumpy melted blob of Quadanium steel about the size of a grown man’s fist with no obvious distinguishing features.

The blackened chunk of metal had a caption: _Piece of the outer hull of the original Death Star. Recovered from the surface of Yavin IV after the Rebellion was flushed out of its hidden base_. It hung suspended in an antigravity field, behind a tube of transparisteel, rotating slowly in somber perpetuity for optimal 360˚ viewing, on a pedestal and beneath a spotlight, the only source of illumination in the room. Double rows of benches had been set up around it for anyone who wanted to sit and contemplate, and on the four walls around them the names of every individual killed by the tragedy over Yavin were listed out—there was even a tiny bracketed area for those held in the cells at the time: a handful of Rebels that had survived the battle and been captured over Scarif. The gallery had been acoustically designed to tamp down noise.

Ira gazed at it contemplatively, wondering with only partial interest how to reconcile what she was looking at with something as larger-than-life as the Death Star and the lives lost; there was a little size comparison holo on a loop behind her, but it still wouldn’t register. _Maybe that’s the point?_ She had been to this museum many times since it had been built, as a child and then as an adult, but comprehension never failed to fail.

The official holos said Starkiller was many times the Death Stars’ size, even the half-finished one destroyed at Endor four years later. _I wish I could see it—Starkiller_.

Well, could have seen it. She tried to ignore the dull, uncertain energy beneath the surface of her calm and it never quite rose to a visible level, but it was a tension shared by everyone in the First Order in the shadow of Starkiller’s destruction, whether they admitted it or not. Most wouldn’t—to voice it was to invite questions. Those weren’t things you sought out beyond the narrow scope of who one trusted. _Can we still win? Yes_ , she wanted to say. _We’re strong, the Republic is weak, and General Hux is capable_.

Ira still didn’t have official word on her distant cousin. Mostly she tried not to think about it. They weren’t telling anybody anything.

She felt a body slide onto the bench beside her, and she glanced over. An unfamiliar male gazed back, mouth curled up at the corners with enduring sardonicism, curly blonde hair on his head.

They were not strictly alone; although there were no others seated on the benches, scores of children in school uniforms roved the gallery, though it remained relatively very quiet. This was not the part of the field trip to kriff up. Two uniformed docents were visible at the far ends of the gallery keeping watch, one behind her, the other hidden by the pedestal. Ira held herself almost motionless, and did not smile. They two were some of the few not in some form of prescribed dress.

He reached down into the gift shop bag resting beside her knee, and pulled out the agreed-upon mark: a small figure in the shape of one of the statues that used to stand in the Emperor’s Palace on Imperial Center. He scoffed as he turned it over, examining it bemusedly, then reached into his coat and handed her the agreed-upon answer: a folded-up flimsy from a certain restaurant. Ira glanced over it to make sure it was the right one, and tucked the flimsy into her pocket, her heart beating like a little bird’s in her throat. She imagined she could feel the little data stick tucked inside, though that would have been like a bean under a thousand mattresses.

He spoke softly, though there should have been no reason to speak at all. “I’ve done deals in a lot of strange places, but a museum?”

Ira shook her head, her voice a solemn murmur. “It’s public. It’s open most of the day. Security is focused on the kids not breaking anything.” And there were always lots of those around; field trips were at least a yearly experience in First Order schools. Ira had always liked the ones to the ISD museum ships in orbit best.

“ _Heh_.” He glanced around. His voice was a hair above audible, and they sat close enough that if either of them had let their legs spread their knees would have touched. “There _are_ a lot of kids here.” That didn’t look as if it thrilled him.

“Do they have any pieces of the Death Star in the Republic?”

“No idea,” he replied with a bored lift of his shoulder. “Not exactly got a membership to the Imperial Fan Club. That’s more Coruscant’s thing.”

 “You shouldn’t call it Coruscant.” Here, anyway. “Most of the debris from the Death Star was drawn into Yavin, which is a gas giant. But some was flung all the way to the surface of its moon; this one used to be on display on Imperial Center. There used to be a memorial to those that died on it in the Imperial Museum there. They had a statue of Grand Moff Tarkin.”

 “ _Fascinating_.” He made no attempt to hide his sarcasm. “Look, I don’t care about history. The past is the past and it ought to stay there.”

Ira hummed to herself, a noncommittal answer if there ever was one. _Such a conceit, to ignore the past_. She lived enmeshed in it. The First Order was making it. She didn’t understand why anyone would want to ignore it.

“Especially the Empire,” he muttered, seemed to remember where he was—then coughed unapologetically, wearing a smirk.

A small sideways twist of her lips was her first answer. _And yet you’re here, happy enough to take my money_. She wanted to ask him what he thought of the destruction of the Hosnian system; she wanted to ask him what he thought about the Centrists and the Pluralists, what they would do. About Kuat, a Centrist planet, declaring secession from the Republic almost immediately in the wake of the Hosnian system—but—

“It never went anywhere,” she said with a measure of calm pride. “It only…focused itself. Here.”

He rolled his shoulders, disturbed. “Well. Doesn’t matter to me who’s in charge. I get paid either way, right?” He glanced at Ira. “You know, if you win, you won’t get anything else like it, they won’t write anything else. Hell, you people wouldn’t let it happen!” There was a brief silence. “This went on my list of weird requests, y’know. Normal people just ask for glitterstim.”

Ira’s lips peeled back in an anemic grin, the light dancing off the shadows from the turning steel, giving them both an almost chiaroscuro appearance. “Really? No one else on Nall asks for books?”

 “Not the kind of books you asked for.”

“Are you accusing people in the First Order of being illiterate?”

“If illiterate means nobody wants to read about history.” He shrugged. “There is a pretty big profit margin in porn, though. Written, graphic—you name it. Some people here are into some karked up shit. One of my customers is into rathtar snuff holos.”

Ira’s eyebrow twitched. _Rathtar snuff holos?_ “Is that why I just paid ten times the retail value?”

“Oh, the snuff goes for a _lot_ more; it’s illegal in Republic space, too. Huge risk. I have to get it from Hutt space.”

 _I am not touching_ any _of that_. Did he seriously expect her to believe him? Why did he bring it up at all? What filth! “Did you actually pay money for this? I’ve heard that in Republic territory you can sometimes just go on the holonet and find free copies of published books.” Ira would download it herself but the home guard was too good at that game. It was important not to get greedy or arrogant; she had known more than one person to get pinched.

Even this meeting was the product of careful dancing around the point and face-to-face and word-of-mouth and slowly stoked desperation—tech was too dangerous. Ira had not grown up thinking she would ever be whispering to someone in private corners (she had _wanted_ to be a star pilot), but here she was.

“Not ones like that.”

“It was a new release last year, so it shouldn’t have been too hard to find…”

“Why do you want to read books written in the Republic about history, anyway? Isn’t it all the same stuff?”

Ira shook her head. “Not exactly.”

“What do you mean? Isn’t there only one version of the truth?”

“ _Truth_.” She scoffed, smiling. “I had a professor who used to say that once you get all the different versions of a speeder crash, history starts to look suspicious.”

“I don’t follow.”

“No one disputes that the speeder crashed,” she said. “Everyone disagrees on how it crashed or words it differently or blames someone else. Then they disagree on what to do about it.”

“Like how the Republic says that Alderaan was a tragedy and the First Order says it was crowd control?”

Ira stiffened and bit her tongue against the worst of her offense. _Yes, but_ … “Alderaan was in bed with the Rebellion. Even the Republic owns that. They hold them up as a sacrifice.”

“Why do you even want to read Republic history if you don’t believe it?”

“To know what they say,” Ira replied. “And it’s not about _believing_. The facts are indisputable, I disagree with their interpretation. Did you know some Centrists think that Luke Skywalker wasn’t the one to destroy the Death Star? I think he did.”

“Why?”

“Truth is stranger than fiction,” she replied. “If they were lying about it, then Skywalker probably would’ve been put up as some kind of political figure after the war. And the claims predate the scandal surrounding Leia Organa so it doesn’t make sense but to be the truth.”

“Why? I mean, why read them at all, then, if you…don’t like what they say? What are you trying to get out of it?”

 _What the kriff does liking what it says have to do with anything?_ “It makes them make sense. You can’t apply Imperial logic to the Rebellion without missing a large part of the argument, because the Rebels had a fundamentally different outlook. The Republic bases their thinking off of that outlook.” She held up her hands and swiped the palms together as if in a near miss. “We all speak Basic but we all speak completely different languages, and you can’t begin to address a problem or unpack it until you’ve at least got an awareness of how someone else understands a concept and frames their argument. Otherwise you’re just speaking in progressively louder rhetoric.”

He stared at her with his eyebrows raised. “So…what are you going to do with this understanding? What do you mean address a problem? Who are you?”

Ira said nothing, she did not want to have that particular discussion. Not with friends, certainly not with him, and because this wasn’t a topic she ever discussed, she didn’t have a cover story lined up to divert him. It was incredibly uncomfortable.

“I work at a laundromat,” she admitted. _Why did I tell him that? Well, whatever. There have to be a hundred laundromats in Carida._

The silence stretched out.

 “If you wanted to see one, I'd let you,” he said, suddenly.

Her eyes widened. “See what?”

“A snuff holo.”

 Ira balked, she couldn’t hide the automatic spasm of revulsion and indignation that ruptured freely over her face.

 “I— _What?_ —You’re disgusting.” She had her flimsy, he could take the gift store bag with its payment inside and bugger off already back to Corellia or wherever he came from. “Why would you even suggest such a thing? What in the galaxy would make you think I would want to see something like that? Who would even want to?” _In fact, I don’t want to think about its existence. What kind of sick kriffing fuck wants to watch movies of real-life murders? He’s lying to me to get a rise!_

 He grinned. “Bored housewives do. Don't be so prissy; I hear at least one of your village elders likes little Twi’lek boys.”

 Ira’s temper cracked. Her voice whipped out, as pristinely Coruscanti as standard elocution lessons could make it. “Do you facilitate that interest, too?”

 “That's way too hot for me. Live cargo? Kriff, no! That gets you the death penalty here. But the Republic doesn’t kill you, they just put you in prison. Which is worse. I’d rather just die than rot for fifty years.”

She had no idea what to say, so she said the first thing that came to mind. “There aren't any aliens in First Order space. Not since negotiations with the Chiss over twenty years ago.”

 “Really? Who told you that?”

 Ira remained obstinately silent a moment. This conversation was revolting.

 “Who told you about alien child prostitution?”

 “Word of advice, lady. Keeping your eyes and ears open is just as good as reading things out of a book.” He shook his head. “Not all of them are crooked, some of you are alright, and not all the Republic’s squeaky clean like they pretend to be either, but no matter which way you cut it or what side you’re on, a good set of eyes and ears go a long way with one of these,” he said, and reached up, tapping Ira just above her hairline.

 She jerked back and slapped his hand away. There was a loud _crack_ that attracted attention; they returned to their business in the stillness when both parties froze and waited for that attention to die down.

 “Don't touch me,” Ira hissed through clenched teeth, flustered.

 He raised his hands in surrender and sat back again.

“Alright, easy,” he said. “No need to get violent. I only meant that you learn all kinds of things if you pay attention.”

 “This place isn't perfect,” Ira said, shrugging, “But it's better than the Republic.”

He smiled gamely. “Why's that?”

She sighed through her nose and tucked in.

 “Efficiency. Order. There is a single source of policy and a centralized decision-making entity that can address problems quickly. The Republic—particularly the New Republic—is far less unified than even the Republic before the Clone Wars.” Ira frowned. “A thousand years ago, the Republic rose organically and over a long period from a need for an interplanetary body to manage trade relations with Imperial Center, and the Jedi Order stood as third-party arbiters, though both eventually grew corrupt; this one now is…an attempt to return to a system whose…well, you can’t turn back time. What complacency existed with respect to assuming that interdependence was shattered by the Separatists in the Clone Wars. The Rebellion picked up where they left off. The Republic is trying to glue back together vase they helped break. The cracks never disappear but they’ve been trying to ignore them.”

The smuggler stared at her in mute disbelief for a moment.

“A smart girl like you could do a lot better than _this_ ,” he snorted, glancing around at their general area, as if to say _doing deals in museums_. Then his eyes turned cool, calculating. “Y’know, from what I hear, there's only a couple reasons you wouldn't be on a ship right now, at your age. I’m sure they’d love to have your ability to play with words. And you don’t look like you have kids or really old parents.”

“Excuse me?”

 “So, what’s wrong with you?”

 “I beg your pardon?!”

 “It’s something medical, isn’t it?”

 Ira’s eyes turned colder than a winter blizzard on Hoth.

“What,” she asked slowly, “Makes you think that?”

He grinned. “In my line of work, you have to know how to figure things out.”

“You’re very clever,” she deadpanned, angling a deeply irritated look at him. “Excuse me.” She stood up and began to walk away, only to realize that the smuggler had stood up too and was following her.

“I wasn’t finished,” he said, striding up next to her with the bag in hand.

“I am.”

“Then it’s true that they don’t treat people with medical problems? I mean—like you can’t get treatment?”

“No, that’s not true.”

“Then why aren’t you on the front lines?”

Ira grit her teeth and affected an air of disinterest.

“That’s what I heard. If you’re born with a disability they don’t bother treating you. Survival of the fittest. Seems like a stupid policy. And that’s kind of sad, if they won’t treat you—”

“It’s not just _any_ condition,” Ira interrupted under her breath, deeply annoyed to be having this conversation. It was none of his business. But at the same time, she was unwilling to let him walk away to tell stars knew who whatever half-baked idiocy he’d cooked up. “Only certain conditions which would require extensive and problematic long-term treatment; it isn’t worth the strain on the First Order’s resources.”

“And you’ve got one of them? Which one? How are you still alive if it’s that bad?”

 “Do you make a habit of asking strangers invasive questions?”

“No. But you don’t make any sense.”

Ira looked at him narrowly.

“You have no reason to be loyal to these bastards whatsoever. You want to read—” He glanced carefully at the people around them in the suddenly far brighter antechambers with more artifacts. “Uh, you want to read things. They won’t even treat you for whatever it is that you can’t help having. If I were you I’d have jumped dirt the first chance I got! Screw these assholes!”

Ira didn’t say what she was thinking, which was that he wasn’t a very scrupulous person to begin with given his chosen occupation, so of course he should have such poor faith.

“I’ve already said why. I believe in the First Order.”

“But they would let you die.”

“This might sound strange to someone whose life is focused around personal gain, but it’s not about me.”

He remained quiet from there, mercifully, until they had finally left the museum and stepped down into the street. The boulevard was lined with symmetrical ranks of red flags marching down the white façades of buildings on both sides, the black-and-red spoked hexagon of the First Order fluttering in a light breeze out of the north under a clear blue sky. Carida wasn’t a large city, only the second largest behind Zhell, but this district had been carefully arranged; buildings were set up as blocks on a grid, and streets were wide and monumental; it made the people there feel small.

“You don’t see all these flags in the Republic,” he commented quietly.

Ira didn’t quite understand the point of that non-sequitur; she shot him a questioning glance, nonetheless still aggravated that this encounter just didn’t want to seem to end.

He gestured above their heads. “These flags. I’ve never seen so many flags in one place. They’re everywhere.”

Ira raised an eyebrow. “They’re just flags.”

“It’s creepy.”

She could not stop herself rolling her eyes and heaving an exasperated sigh. “Now you have a problem with the flags!”

“But didn’t you say you want to understand why the Republic does the things that it does?”

She stifled herself with an effort. _I am not going to encourage him_. The part of her that knew just how dangerous what she was doing was screaming, growing louder the longer this encounter refused to end, and she was beginning to wonder if she was going to have to add _ditch a tail_ to the litany of other Strange Life Skills she had needed to cultivate.

As ever, it looked as if this was going to be a Learn by Doing situation. The first lesson had been: always— _ALWAYS_ —arrange a meeting in a public place during daylight hours. _The price I pay_ …

 _What if someone I know sees me?_ The faintly hysterical resonance of that thought slipped its cold fingers around her heart and gripped tight; she ignored him and walked a bit faster. _If anyone catches me_ …

It wouldn’t be a fine this time, not after that brush with home guard two years ago. And that had only been a little thing. If she got caught with banned Republic literature…

“Go away,” Ira hissed.

 “Stop making it awkward,” he retorted glibly.

 Ira seethed in helpless fear and anger; with these encounters, there was always a risk incurred, usually blunted by a mutual interest in discretion, but…

_Oh stars, he couldn’t be home guard, could he? A sting operation? No—if he were he wouldn’t have let me go at all, he’d have arrested me in the museum. Right? Right?_

 Her eyes scanned the street, trying in vain to think of what to do. Her mind had cannoned frantically into hyperspace as she tried to make sense of what was happening.

 “Please leave me alone,” she muttered. It wasn't a plan but a default, a last redoubt--she couldn't think of even one other option.

 He glanced at her in surprise. Was that realization on his face? It was hard to tell; she wasn't exceptional at reading faces.

 “You should come with me. I mean—leave this place.”

 “ _No_.” That was an appalling idea, for any number of reasons.

 “You don't have to like the Republic to be treated there. Why do you want to stay so badly?”

 Ira was almost frantic, imagining home guard popping out of nowhere; she saw none. So they could be anywhere, closing in. The political police didn’t wear uniforms, only the criminal police did. This would be under the political police’s jurisdiction. The distraction made her chatty, willing to throw him a bone if it got him to go away. “Because I don't need to leave.” _Why do you even care?_

_Maybe he’s not home guard but they're using him to find people like me? Made a deal?_

 “But—”

 “If I can graduate, my appeal will go through.” _Go to hell. GO. TO. HELL_.

 “Graduate?”

 “Yes,” she spat.

 “From what?”

 “University.”

 “I thought you said you work at a laundromat.”

 “I do.”

 “Alright, but what does that have to do with an appeal? What—”

 “When my appeal goes before the board I can argue being useful enough to the First Order to merit the resources needed for my treatment.”

 He froze in place; Ira reflexively staggered to a stop and looked back at him, surprised. His nose was wrinkled up as if he'd smelled something foul.

 “Lady, that's karked. They can't be that hard up for whatever you need.”

 “It's about rational division of—”

 “ _It's karked_.” His eyes darkened. “Stop making excuses.”

 Ira felt her spine stiffen. “I wouldn't expect you to understand.”

 “There's nothing to understand!” He leaned in a little closer. “Your value isn't tied up in how useful you are!”

 But it _was_ —and that was how an efficient state _should_ behave. How did society benefit from sinking precious finite resources into a black hole? Ira was not a drain—at least, she would tip the scales in her favor, be worth the cost. Her family didn’t have the status or money to just make it happen.

 Ira felt herself sneer with all the scorn of the damned and the defiant.

 “Useless sentimentalism like that is why the Republic is going to fall.”

 His eyes widened and he laughed, a single gout of disbelief. He straightened up.

 “There's a lot more of them than there are of you,” he pointed out. “It's just a matter of time.”

 “We’ll see. Some systems have already declared secession and joined the First Order.”

 “Some,” he agreed harshly. “Kuat. I’m sure Coruscant isn't far behind. Worlds that did better under the Empire. That doesn't mean the war is already won.”

 “Powerful systems.”

 He shook his head. “You can't argue with a fanatic!” he exclaimed, throwing up her hands. “Never argue with a Gamorrean! It frustrates you and annoys the Gamorrean!”

 “That’s not a rational argument!” she snarled quietly, her nerves splintering into a thousand pieces and collapsing at her feet. “Go away and _leave me alone!_ ”

 Around them, the other people on the street glanced up, startled, and hurried on, deciding that this conversation was not one they wanted a piece of.

 Ira winced, feeling a strained ache beneath her breastbone. She rubbed at it and suppressed a grimace.

 The smuggler stared at her, just as surprised.

 “Okay,” he said. “I thought you guys were supposed to be calm, like it was bred into you.”

 She shot him an evil look and walked away--well, stomped.

 He didn't follow.

* * *

 

*

Several hours later in the privacy and darkness of her little flat with the curtains drawn, as Ira scanned and re-scanned the data stick to stave off a paranoia that just wouldn’t dissipate, her second, jailbroken datapad (the one she used for things she didn’t want on her regular datapad) gave a gentle _ting_.

She opened the message cautiously.

There was no immediately obvious way to know it was from the smuggler. The dark side of the holonet used a system of continually reconfiguring encryption codes which were never the same twice; that was how anonymity was maintained. Ira didn’t fully understand how it worked, but it did.

What was _not_ anonymous was the string of numbers beneath one message:

_Lady,_

_In case you need anything else_. – _Domoe_

And numbers for a comlink?

 Ira flung the datapad away, spooked. It came to rest after a bounce on her little bed, and she stood staring at it as the screen glowed, hanging back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Really long, this one, but worldbuilding begins somewhere. Ps, of freaking course Tarkin got a statue and Krennic didn’t. Ahahahahaha. Was there ever any doubt (I fucking adore Krennic he’s such a Drama ~~Queen~~ Empress).
> 
> Before you ask, yes, some Centrist in canon really did doubt if Luke Skywalker really blew up the Death Star. If that sounds stupid, well, I mean, I don’t know what to tell you except to Google ‘conspiracy theories’ with a stiff drink in hand.
> 
> Soo…quick note: just because characters appear one time doesn’t mean they never appear again. The numbers next to their names are the ordinal numbers of their appearance. So just because someone has already showed up doesn’t mean they’re off the table for another appearance; there will be further appearances, and characters will be further fleshed out in the future.
> 
> Having written this chapter I really rather want to write Unamo again. She has an interesting perspective and I kind of want to know what shenanigans the Finalizer’s been up to and how military side is doing.
> 
> So, the OC. Quick note about that because I’m feeling kind of iffy.
> 
> This chapter is narrowed down from two initially separate planned OC’s; Ira by herself could easily involve the other one and so we might as well just collapse the mission creep with respect to OCs and stick to the canon characters. She also doesn’t need to appear as often as the others overall, so, please, bear with me and skip over these chapters if you don’t like them. 
> 
> Ps, Ira is an information junkie who’s spent a lot (a lot) of time in school, so, fair warning, she’s going to have a somewhat different, more of a commentator spin on things than most perspectives in this story. In a world where people shoot things, she has a book. Even so, I did not write her to be my personal mouthpiece or to be that one person who ‘sees the light.’ Gonna go ahead and preempt that thought. She has thoughts, but I don’t believe in making things THAT easy.
> 
> Possession of illegal literature. Huh, sounds like 1984.


	5. Daine Jir - 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TLJ IS ALMOST OUT OMG OMG OMGGGG.
> 
> And I haven’t fucking updated since June what. The fuck. Is wrong with me…
> 
> I just need to stop being trash in general and actually finish what I say I’m going to finish.
> 
> Warning ahead of time: I don’t mean to single Jir out as the single human supremacist in this fic…but let’s face it, human supremacy is still a part of Imperial policy and worldview. I imagine some people actually believe it, and that really ought not to be ignored. People are more complicated than total lockstep, and their opinions vary, but some *will* take the bait. No character is obligated to be or not to be, but there’s not been any opportunity to really address these issues one way or another elsewhere, since this is the first time a non-human has appeared. And so, while this doesn’t really get into it…it’s still there. 
> 
> Problematic shit is problematic. Problematic faves are problematic.
> 
> Unedited, so...sorry.

_5 ABY, in the immediate aftermath of the Battle of Jakku…_

Out of the graveyard, in the middle of the still-burning debris littered across the surface of the planet, stood the dead. They rose up from a sandblasted no-man’s-land all at once and turned, heavily, as they were told, towards a waiting ship which had settled in the oily black smoke that covered the sky and turned the midday sun to twilight. It wasn’t a very long walk, but the sand made the trip difficult. Some needed help to get there, in black and in gray and in officer’s green.

The feel of cooled air on his skin after the roasting hell of Jakku left Daine Jir in a certain amount of pain, not unlike being thrown naked into a pool of ice water. Sweat flattened his rusty hair to his skull and turned clammy, and the cooling, drying blood which ran from his shattered nose and cut forehead that touched his lips with metallic taste made him shiver. The reek of burning flesh, of ozone, oil, grease, and fuel seemed so deeply embedded into his skin that he wondered whether he would ever again escape it.

He was dead on his feet. His limbs felt leaden, his head was so thick and heavy he had a hard time processing anything except that _it’s over, it’s done, we’ve lost, I’m captured, keep walking_. It didn’t seem possible, it was too much, but it _was_.

After hours of sitting unprotected among hundreds of others like him, stripped of their weapons and under armed guard, Jir allowed himself to be herded into the huge belly of the transport, blinking, blinded by the sudden reduced light. He was stripped of his Stormtrooper armor to his black body suit and boots, which gave inadequate protection against the shocking chill. And he wasn’t the only one. _We’re all going to get sick. These kriffing idiots have no idea what they’re doing_.

It was as ad hoc as the rest of the Rebellion: an ancient but enormous drop ship that had somehow outlived the Clone Wars. Jir had seen the rebel starbird painted over the faded shadow of the Separatist hexagon on its ragged hull as it landed, but Jir didn’t have the energy to laugh. Inside, everything used for droid transport had been stripped away to make room for flesh and blood prisoners.

Prisoners?

 _Prisoners? Rebels don’t take prisoners, they have nowhere to keep them. What are they going to do with us?_ Then again, with this loss…who knew…

Jir lifted his chin disdainfully at the nearest rebel, an alien who pointed a blaster rifle at him and ordered him to sit down.

“Not that I’d mind if you fell flat on your ass,” it said. “But sit down anyway.”

Those around him eyed Jir with glazed eyes, and waited tensely for the Commander to act.

“Where are you taking us?”

“Don’t worry about it.” The alien pointed its weapon directly in his face. “You’ll find out soon enough. Now, sit down.”

 _Do you intend to open the airlock once we’re in deep space, out of sight and out of mind, and let us all drift away? Into a star, maybe? A black hole?_ That was how deep space pirates disposed of bodies without leaving evidence.

An angry murmur rippled through the crowd. They were unarmed and unarmored, but they still had superior numbers. It would take time for reinforcements to get here…

Jir weighed his options as he stared back, wondering if Bothans were more or less savage than other aliens, and how he might use that.

If he pushed the issue, it might start a riot. They might get this one’s blaster, they might get a few blasters…but there was not even a reasonable guarantee they could commandeer a transport and escape through a solid wall of rebel ships in orbit. Those who could escape had made the jump to hyperspace hours ago. They were what was left, who hadn’t made it to the shuttles in time, and they would die in a futile last attempt to escape. _Escape to where?_ Jir had heard something about an Observatory on this planet; something about the Unknown Regions, but…

He wished them luck, wherever they were.

Did he dare risk the lives of everyone around him, or had they lost enough today?

Behind the Bothan, a steadily thickening curtain of onlookers were gathering, their chilly eyes narrowed and intense.

There weren’t many guards to be seen. Any others, actually…

He didn’t know. He wanted to have some idea, not just to _act_.

“You don’t want to shoot me. They’ll tear you apart like a pack of garrals.”

It glanced over its shoulder and flinched at the sight of being so close and alone among a crowd, all watching it. Its pricked ears flicked back, betraying its unease. It lifted its hand slowly to its waist…

Jir realized what was happening an instant too late. _Damn_. It was equipped with something that signaled for backup.

“I don’t know where we’re going. Off Jakku. That’s worth something, isn’t it? Now look; the fleet in orbit is on notice to shoot down any ship that could be a threat to it. If you cause trouble, they’ll fire.”

“This sort of ship doesn’t have weapons.”

“It’s large enough to do some damage.”

Jir didn’t move.

“Well, don’t sit, then,” it sighed at last. “But these things aren’t exactly the cutting edge of technology when it comes to takeoff and landing. If the lot of you fall ass over end and get pressed to death in a corner, don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

Jir raised an eyebrow. It was rather painful, and probably opened up a scrape or two.

“I will try and find out as soon as I can where you’re being taken,” it said. “I can come and find you later. Who should I ask for…?”

“Commander Daine Jir,” he said. “501st.”

“501st? That was Vader’s division, wasn’t it?”

Jir said nothing, but was spared the need to do so when a hiss from above shortly preceded a sudden clattering appearance of rebels above their heads on catwalks armed with blaster rifles. He glanced above, and cursed under his breath, aware now that if he had ever had a chance, he had lost it. He might take this thing off its feet and out of the galaxy, but he wouldn’t live long afterwards. Nor would very many others.

Finally, it shook its head as if disappointed.

“This doesn’t have to be hard, you know? The war is over.”

Jir sneered silently down his nose.

“You should go and join them,” he said, glancing up over his head again at the other rebels. _Get out of here, scum. You’re not welcome_.

To the side, the great blast doors hissed shut, sealing them inside the belly of the ship with no natural light. The Bothan stood very still, its fur at attention. It looked deeply alarmed.

“I’ll bring the information as soon as I can,” it said. “Until then, you should sit.”

Jir chose not to, but the Bothan left anyway, forced to push its way through a sullen and uncooperative crowd that only barely stooped to let him pass.

He felt the ship’s engines rumble under his feet, and he almost staggered off his balance when it suddenly lurched. Some didn’t manage.

 _Maybe I_ should _have sat down_ , he thought, wryly. _I’m barely strong enough to stand as it is_.

 _No._ He could not show weakness here, in front of everyone. Under the eyes of the rebel scum.

He looked around himself, at the loosening knots of people, and slowly turned around, casting a deathly slow stare across the field of people. Some had taken the rebels up on their invitation to sit or had been thrown to the deck.

“They must have picked these out specially, Commander! To be the worst ride they could get.”

Jir turned around, shifted again to compensate for a particularly violent jolt, and looked back at a short woman wearing a pale gray AT-AT pilot jumpsuit, smudged almost black with soot except for where her cuirass had fitted over her chest. She grinned at him wryly past a scorched cheek, sitting cross-legged.

“These ships were never equipped with gravity equalizers for use in atmo. Droids were packed up in racks for an assault. It should even out soon, but until then it’ll be a bumpy ride.” She paused. “With respect, sir, I really think…”

She trailed off, as Jir levered himself to the deck, careful of his wounds and bruises. He didn’t have anywhere else to sit; the rebels seemed to have little respect for his rank and it wasn’t as if he recognized anyone around him. After Endor, the 501st had been reassigned, and he'd lost track of both ships and other Troopers in the battle. He hoped somebody made it out.

Stars, it was cold in here. 

He glanced around again, surreptitiously.

“How much do you know about these ships?”

She raised her invisibly pale eyebrows. “A little. I wasn’t a star pilot. Couldn’t pass the V-SPAP. Mostly I just watched a lot of holos. They aren’t meant to accommodate many sentients. In the holos it’s only ever the commander—General Grievous, or Count Dooku—who are alive on these things...Why?”

Jir paused, studying the entrances and exits, taking stock of what was there. “How many rebels do you think there are are on this ship?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah this wasn’t intended to be this long. Just a little scene of getting captured. Shit.
> 
> And…now I’m wondering who the hell would portray an in-universe movie version of Christopher Lee. Double shit.
> 
> Maybe I should stop resurrecting obscure Imperials.
> 
> Eeeeeeh I do what I want. (Daine Jir, literally the dude on the Tantive IV with Vader going on about holding Leia being dangerous.) 
> 
> There IS an overall goal to my resurrections, though; I just…had a plan written up for how EXACTLY I’m going to get there that promptly went to shit because I can’t write things on time.
> 
> I swear I have NOT given up on this fic, not for one second. I have been trying to work on it, almost to distraction. Summer sucked, fall sucked worse, my sanity feels like it’s rapidly unraveling, but…on top of all that, I have a worse track record for sticking to deadlines than GRRM and I’ve rewritten everything like ten times. This was short and manageable?
> 
> And why an old CIS dropship? Well, I was reading something or other and somebody calculated off of Cassian’s comment that he’d been “in this fight since he was 6 years old.” Cassian was basically part of a CIS group in the Clone Wars, and…
> 
> And somehow that's never directly mentioned SO THERE.
> 
> Well, I mean, for all the shit the prequels get, I think the politics are really interesting. (Which is probably why I’m writing that other fic to, buuuuut…) I think it’s not surprising that former Separatists would see enough of their cause in the Rebellion to join up with them.
> 
> I swear, cats, alcohol, Netflix, and slashfic are the only reasons I’m surviving grad school (ONE. MORE. SEMESTER. And I’ve got to make my applications for the next programs or jobs soon, kill me please *crying*). I got a new kitten though. It is smol and orange. It runs around like a psychopath and my adult cat hates it, and glares at me like everything wrong with the world is my fault. Bitch, you did the psycho running thing too don’t make that face at me.
> 
> PS. I made up V-SPAP, mostly to play off the plethora of tests with names like it in the military, and acronyms. It stands for vacuum – spatial apperception. Lol
> 
> PPS. I fucking loved the German series Dark on Netflix and people need to watch it so there’s a season 2. Time travel usually sucks, but I really liked it.


	6. Moden Canady - x

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (The x means this is the single planned chapter for this character.)
> 
> If your first thought is, but I thought you already said literature can be illegal in FO territory, this is set about 10 years before TFA. It's not illegal...yet.

_In 24ABY_ …

Most people tended to think _military bearing_ was something learned under serious circumstances—pitched battles, mission failures—And that happened, of course, but usually it was honed under less dire situations.

Moden Canady was an officer of the Imperial Navy, and he would not give General Brendol bloody Hux of all people the satisfaction of undermining his composure.

Moden willed his expression to remain neutral, even while the bloated, ruddy face standing very close in front of him waited with completely inappropriate hunger for any crack, any flaw to exploit, which would put Moden at risk of a demotion or summary forced retirement. Make him part of the purge, as some had begun to call it, whispered, without a trace of shame—

“I have no use for officers who cannot embody the appropriate level of ideological commitment to our cause.”

Moden stiffened slightly, fighting to keep his mouth shut. He knew exactly what was really being said here.

Ideology. _Ha_. What a cheap excuse!

What was meant was his unquestioning and unthinking obedience, because ideology had become increasingly synonymous with position. Immediately after Jakku, what existed of the civil service of the Empire vanished. If all power derived solely from position in the military hierarchy, the sole source of structure, and the authority of that position was to be unquestioned and unquestionable, then ideology was really whatever the person at the top said it was.

What General Hux wanted was Captain Canady’s loyalty. Moden had gathered enough about what was really going on around him, thirdhand or from people he knew. People who kissed this man’s fat arse made it out unscathed. Even promoted.

If he flatly rebuffed the insinuations, ‘someone’ would find a reason to go after him (working through those in the system who were loyal and looking for a way to get ahead or, worse, were actual believers). Regardless, whatever transpired here today would be flatly denied to have had the underlying character that it did. Not even Brendol Hux was stupid enough to try and get away with this kind of thing in plain language, but nevertheless…well, there it was.

Somewhere deep down, he felt like he was still waiting to wake up in his stateroom on the _Solicitude_ and realize that everything that had happened at Endor and afterwards had been one surreal, horrible dream.

But for as long as that kept not happening, he would just have to keep going, no matter terrible how things kept getting.

A very, very sick knot gathered in his stomach, and sank.

This was not a conversation he wanted to have at all, not least because he was at least partly distracted by fighting back the urge to punch the other man in the face. Moden would never understand why Brendol Hux of all people had been chosen to have a hand in the resuscitation of the Empire. The Commandant of an Imperial Academy? What had Rax and Sloane been thinking?

“I was unaware I had done anything to suggest a lack of commitment to the cause.” Moden wasn’t a bloody politician, he was a military commander. This wasn’t natural to him. Some people politicked in the Imperial military, but mostly it had regulations and one had to abide by them, lockstep, regardless. Malicious compliance was more of an issue. Here, though…

“Oh, but you have!” Hux retorted, that openly eager expression shuttering in an instant. It turned poisonous, and Moden perceived that he was on thin ice. “You have demonstrated _egregious_ disregard for the cause!”

Regulations were relativized.

 _Watch yourself, or you’ll find yourself on the curb with a pink form, and then you can’t do anybody any good_.

Moden was trying to think of a more or less non-sarcastic way of asking what the hell Hux’s major malfunction was (it was proving extremely difficult, really, and the answer was probably _many things_ , including having been dropped on his head as an infant) when Hux barreled right along, oblivious as usual.

“I mean your failure to report Commander Niero’s treason, of course!”

 _What—Commander Niero? Solensa Niero? My NavO?_ Moden hesitated; his stomach got very cold all of a sudden, too. “I am unware of any treasonous—"

“Oh, shut up, Canady,” Hux interrupted. “I have proof.”

 _Proof?_ Moden struggled to piece out what he was looking at here under an increasing sense of disquiet. This wasn’t the kind of battle he was best equipped to fight, but he wasn’t about to be bowled over instantly, especially by a statement that meaninglessly vague. If Niero had actually done something properly wrong which merited an investigation, surely the proper channels would have sufficed.

Moden would not throw her out the airlock to save his own neck. _Absolutely not, Hux. The people under me need to know they can rely on my support if I can have any hope of having theirs_. He would find some way of protecting her; this hemorrhaging of capable, experienced officers could not be allowed to go unchecked. There was, frankly, no noncancerous reason that Hux would have pulled him into his office to speak personally over a single member of Moden’s staff about a vague issue like this. No reason for the General of the First Order to target an individual Commander on any individual Star Destroyer. There were around four or five levels of authority between Moden and Hux, and to bypass all of that and drag Moden front and center personally and with no one else in the office out of that list…

“Commander Niero has always been a loyal officer of the Empire—”

“That’s part of the problem, Captain,” Hux interrupted again with a triumphant, vicious leer. “A loyal officer of the _Empire_. Loyalty to flawed, weak ideology will not be tolerated in the First Order.”

 _If I broke his face I’d never have to buy my own drinks again for the rest of my life_. But if he went that far, that life would be short as he’d probably end up in front of a firing squad before the week was out, and Hux would still win. _Steady on_.

“My apologies, General, but I fail to understand precisely what it is that Commander Niero has been accused of. What treasonous activity has she engaged in?”

Hux scowled impatiently. “Possession of unsuitable literature,” he spat. Moden suspected he hadn’t expected to _discuss_ the issue at all, merely to receive Niero’s head on a silver platter.

“Possession of—” He choked on the words, bewildered, and struggling with himself to hold on. His mind went, absurdly, to the yottabytes of pornography that were an inevitable part of long deployments. Officially, it was against regulations to have it on board. Unofficially, it was an open secret that pretty much everyone had some. As far as _unsuitable literature_ was concerned, it was all he could think of, as astonished as he was. _Is Hux actually going to attempt to make the First Order celibate like the Jedi? Look how well that turned out for them!_

“Commander Niero has in her personal possession transcripts of speeches given by Count Dooku, leader of the Separatist armies during the Clone Wars, to members of the Trade Federation and Banking Clan. What would a loyal member of the Empire need with those?”

 _You’re joking. You’re bloody joking! That’s what we’re discussing?_ It was utterly bizarre, yet it appeared that Hux actually intended to make this a serious issue.

“Commander Niero has a keen interest in history, though this interest has never had a negative impact on her performance before. And I am unaware of any law or regulation which restricts ownership of any such transcripts.” _If Hux is in this much of a snit about whatever a dead Separatist said, imagine his outrage if he knew just how often Niero rambled about the Jedi in the wardroom_. Niero wasn’t at all complimentary of Separatists or Jedi, but he suspected Hux wouldn’t see the difference. Anyway it didn’t matter, because there wasn't a real issue to begin with.

Speaking of finding things out, how did he know about these transcripts in the first place?

The look on Hux’s face was suddenly almost like he’d stepped in something foul, and he started to speak, so Moden spoke over him quickly, seizing the initiative while he had the chance. It was risky, all things considered—but Hux, more concerned with looking like a General than having any real awareness of how to behave like one (what did a schoolhouse armchair officer know about how a General behaved), affected to withstand Moden’s interruption in prickly silence.

“This is, however, a serious issue, and one into which I will make a thorough investigation,” Moden said firmly, staring straight back at Hux, all but staring him down. “I assure you, General, there will be a satisfactory resolution. Commander Niero will not be allowed to continue in her present attitude.”

It felt odd, and he wondered, uneasily, if he were laying it on too thick or too thin. When he’d been trained to withstand interrogation, he’d been instructed to remain general if he said anything, to say as little as possible of real substance. He supposed it was the same concept if he just led Hux to draw his own conclusions. Best case scenario, he could make a big show of slapping her on the wrist, and everything could be forgotten by next week. On the whole, this didn’t seem more serious than a feint or an attempt to sound him out.

 _I hope I’ve made a third option that will work_ , he thought grimly. The Empire generally hadn’t cared much what went on in a person’s head provided they followed orders and didn’t break regulations; this First Order that Hux wanted to create…were opinions a crime? Ownership of something was not illegal, but the reasons behind wanting to own a thing were? Was that where this was headed?

“…Very well,” Hux said, staring at Moden narrowly. “See that you do, Captain. It is my privilege to have been entrusted with overseeing the creation of the force which will create a renewed, and more powerful Empire which will bring true order to the galaxy, but it cannot be accomplished alone. We must all work together.”

_Once he gets rid of everyone who won’t go along with him, what will be left?_

“Yes, sir,” Moden said, and hoped—

“Dismissed,” Hux snapped.

 _Thank the stars_. Moden saluted, which Hux returned with a flippant irritation, as if inconvenienced by the lesser-ranking officer’s presence, just before he turned away. Whatever feeling Moden might have had over that lackluster response was muted by his desire to get out of there, and he about faced and walked— _not ran_ —out of the office. That conversation had felt much longer than it actually had been.

Once he was in the hallway he picked up the pace, and ignored everyone around him as he strode to the turbolift that would take him to the ground floor. The architecture was wide and soaring like that of Coruscant, and oppressively white.

All aspects of the newly-built Academy in Zhell were still new, the walls and even the landscaping outside. There was an earnest, plast-like gleam to all of it that almost gave him a headache. It felt nothing like the Imperial Academy on Coruscant, which by the time he had graduated had been around for more than twenty years. It felt lived-in and established, but all of that could have been taken for the ravages of time if not for what filled it.

He ignored the light and air around him and stepped inside the turbolift. Outside, he could see the parade grounds, and the small but swelling city around it. The Academy and the parade grounds were some of the first permanent structures to be completed on Nall, but the city hadn’t kept up until now.

The very first waves of officers to receive their commissions in the Republic, before a single cadet had earned his badge, had mostly been sourced from local peacekeeping or military forces throughout the Republic. Even then, the learning curve then had been perilously steep for waging intersystemic war, and the hard-won experiences of that war had informed the Imperial ranks with insights that simply couldn’t be taught in a classroom. A simulator was not a real-life battle. People and equipment broke, in strange ways.

As young as he’d been when given command of the _Solicitude_ , he had had the advantage of an experienced crew and crack officer staff from whom he had learned a great deal. His XO, if he’d had any negative thoughts, kept them to himself, but Captain Delton had been capable of transmogrifying Moden’s earliest floundering into a semblance of actual authority, and been willing to speak up when he felt Moden was making an oversight—respectfully, of course, but—never for his individual gratification.

But that was how things worked in the Imperial Navy, not out here in the Unknown Regions, where they were presided over by Brendol Hux—not a superior officer, merely a higher ranking one.

When the lift finally opened to the ground floor, he passed two disturbingly young-looking men who wore white and red shoulder cords, which marked them as teaching staff. _I wonder if they have the right ideological mindset_ , he thought bitterly, then pushed it away as he made his way through the hallways, all bright and shiny and gleaming.

Right now, he needed to be back on his ship.

Lieutenant Valko jumped up from the crates by the shuttle as Moden strode out onto the tarmac. It was hot and humid in this part of the planet, and somehow very nearly flat all around them. He saluted when he drew near; Moden returned the salute without breaking stride or the grim look on his face. Valko followed in a hurry.

“Er—Captain?”

“Get the engines started. I want us in the air _now_. We’re returning to the ship.”

Valko stared. “Yes, sir!” He rushed up the ramp, and into the head of the shuttle. The ion engines fired up with a whine, and Moden felt a little better when he felt the ground fall out from beneath them.

The trip wasn’t long, and all too soon—before he had any idea what he was going to do or say to make this problem disappear—Valko appeared in the belly of the shuttle and looked at him.

“We’re here, sir,” he said.

Moden glanced up. “Thank you, Lieutenant.” He stood and walked ahead of Valko out into the main hangar. He was not accosted by anyone while he made his way through the passageways and turbolifts to the tower, a trip that also felt awfully short.

His office on the _Solicitude_ had offered a familiar view for around twenty years now, one almost identical to that of the bridge, from which he could look out over his ship.

He’d heard it said that all of the old _Imperial_ -class Star Destroyers were slated to be decommissioned soon, and that they would all be cross-decked to whatever replaced them. If any were likely to survive, it was as a museum ship, as they’d done with the _Executrix_. Moden ran his fingers along his desk, almost uncomfortably aware of how familiar every buffed and shined scuffmark was, and that he would soon lose that sense, and everything would take on that package-perfect newness, like the Academy. Much as he enjoyed that arms were finally flowing into the First Order and they no longer had to jerry-rig or cannibalize the systems they had just to keep flying, he would miss the _Solicitude_ , with all the quirks she had developed over the years.

 _You don’t have time for this right now_.

He turned to the holo-screen.

Niero had to be found, whether by the young Petty Officer that answered or whomever did, but she stood in front of him in less than ten minutes. She arrived and strode in to find Moden gazing out at the _Solicitude_ , with his hands behind his back, as the sun rose over Nall’s horizon.

Commander Niero came to a halt and saluted. His summons had been sharp and brooked little invitation for questions, but he finally pulled himself from the view and his head and pivoted on his heel. He returned the salute, and they both dropped their hands.

Niero did not miss that he did not give her permission to be at ease, and a crease of worry flickered across her face as she shifted to a parade rest, with her legs spaced shoulder-width apart, and her hands behind her back.

“My apologies, but I don’t understand what’s going on, Captain.”

“I have just returned from the Academy in Zhell. I was called to a meeting with General Hux.”

Niero was all but transparently curious, but totally innocent of even the shade of suspicion that she had been its subject. He’d known the woman for close to ten years now, four of which she’d been his NavO, but she had been on the _Solicitude_ for close to fifteen. Such a long working relationship, one they shared with the vast majority of the crew, had never been the norm in the Empire; with a few exceptions, the average time in any one duty station was between two to four years. With no one to replace them and nowhere to go, many had been frozen in the rank and position they had been at Jakku, at least on ships that had survived this long. The _Solicitude_ was not unique. _And now we’re being frozen out for more reasons than that_. It might have made him laugh or cry—he couldn’t decide, and in any case, he just wouldn’t. His resolve remained constant, he was still proud to serve and he believed wholeheartedly in what he was doing there, but the circumstances of his service were becoming increasingly…

“Sir? I don’t understand what that has to do with me…”

Absurd.

“He believes you are in possession of ideologically questionable literature,” he said bluntly, not without a bitter wryness.

There was no actual legal standing for anything that had been said.

Yet.

Moden supposed his time out here had changed him as well. Delton would never have let him put the blame on his superior when speaking to a subordinate he had to punish, but Delton was long-dead, Niero had done nothing to deserve this punishment, and the First Order couldn’t afford to lose her. Among those former front-line soldiers and sailors of the Empire that found themselves in the Unknown Regions, a kind of unusually close solidarity existed—even with the reckless, obstreperous dregs of the Death Squadron—and now that they found themselves in this situation it was impossible to set that aside.

Niero flinched and had to take a moment to gather her wits as the color drained from her face and she stared at him in total confusion.

“I— _Possession of ideologically questionable literature?_ Is that…uh, I don’t understand…”

“Evidently your historical interest in the Clone Wars and the Republic has caused some to question your loyalty.”

“But that’s ridiculous,” Niero blurted out, before pushing herself back into line, with only the barest hint of a strained voice. “Since when is reading about history illegal?”

“You will continue to show up for shift as usual but are confined to quarters during liberty hours until further notice,” he went on, hoping that Niero understood what he had to do. If she were half as intelligent as he’d come to expect, she would figure it out. “Furthermore, all literature pertaining to historical events in your possession is to be surrendered at once to security for review. I do not want to hear of you discussing historical events, with anyone, in the future.”

“You might as well tell me to cut my own leg off,” Niero spat. “ _Sir_.”

“You will also receive additional training on the doctrine of the First Order, Commander. Upon completion of this training, I will review your performance and make a decision whether further action is needed.” He would let that political officer, who looked barely old enough to drink and was probably not, chew on his Commander for a week, rubberstamp a notification of completion, then let her off the ship. The loss of her books was unfortunate but necessary. The stars knew she had read all of them five times by now and all but had them memorized, but Moden didn’t blame her for being angry.

Niero choked, horrified, but reacted to his pointed use of her rank and his impassive tone by smothering her hurt under a layer of duracrete calm.

“But…you aren’t cashiering me, sir?” she asked, with only a shadow of her previous indignation.

“I prefer to give my subordinates a chance to bring themselves into compliance and not space them at the first opportunity.” _We need experience, Niero. We can’t afford to lose it. Don’t kark this up_.

Niero’s shoulders sagged and she sighed, twisting her fingers behind her back.

“Permission to be frank, sir?”

“Permission not granted. This is not negotiable, I do not want to throw you away. You are a proven, capable officer, and with ships and weapons coming in from planets and organizations sympathetic to the First Order in large number, we have new opportunities opening up.” Niero’s graying eyebrows rose on her forehead. “I would much rather lose you to your own command. I would think that Ensign Dal would appreciate a promotion after twenty years. He’s more than earned it.”

Niero couldn’t quite help but smirk, and Moden allowed himself a small smile.

“That will be all. Dismissed, Commander Niero.”

She came to attention and saluted him again, which he returned again. Then she performed an about-face, and left, perhaps a little stiff in the shoulders.

Well, then; if Hux even cared that Niero existed after a week, which Moden wouldn’t have put a single red credit on, he’d have something to show.

Moden sighed, taking the opportunity to go behind his desk and sit down. Now that he was alone, he allowed himself to slump a little, put an elbow on the armrest, lean his head against his hand, and shut his eyes.

He was on the wrong side of 50, there were lines on his face from perpetual worry, yet never once thought of himself as _old_. He’d been in this fight since he’d stepped foot in the Academy in his late teens, and it was almost surprising to look back and realize just how much time had passed while he wasn’t paying attention. He could reconstruct a timeline in his head, sure—a series of events that summed up a lifetime—but that did nothing to dispel the sense that on some level, he was still that same kid who joined up all those years ago. Everything that had come after had simply added up to the reality in which he found himself that day, coloring and informing his decisions.

Nothing in that entire chain of events had prepared him to handle the circumstances with which he was now faced. He had nothing to guide him here except his own convictions, his loyalty to the Empire and his belief in the same, and he sometimes wasn’t sure what that meant anymore or where it would go.

He jerked to life again, reached down into the bottom drawer of his desk, and pulled out a half-bottle of Chandrilan raava he saved for special occasions or really bad days, and the chipped glass he’d dragged along for a few decades, after he'd stolen it from a bar on Coruscant he frequented as a cadet the night before he shipped out to his first posting. He poured himself a finger, and mulled over it a moment before throwing it all back.

Well. He supposed it would just have to cross that bridge when he came to it. Someone had to stick around and make sure these kids didn't get themselves killed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay maybe I shouldn’t have done this because I started this fic before TLJ came out and I’m still stuck on “should I stick to my original plan……or can I adapt and add it because oh good lord interesting things just opened up”…but…regardless, guys, Canady. Dark horse fave out of left field throwing shade left and right. We’re gonna do this. It's impossible to find Canady content.
> 
> You also might observe: “GENERAL Brendol Hux”? He’s a Commandant and you’ve said so previously! Well, canonically, he did reach the rank of General, but canonically he’s also dead. So…because I started writing this fic before that tidbit came out, we can just assume in this story he was deposed and not killed. Not to say the son is any nicer but…Er…somehow? Okay? Okay. It doesn’t change much, really. I’m sure the timeline seems a bit schizo to just read. Eh. Sorry.
> 
> Also, someone suggested scruffy Imperials, like, officers that look like pirates. God damn, now I need some equipment cannibalizing for parts in the Unknown Regions and Drama™ after Jakku before materiel started to flow back in. Think of the Aesthetic™.
> 
> And…and while writing this, the headcanon occurred to me that the FO actually enforces porn bans, so everyone on board those ships has a serious case of the blue balls. No wonder they’ve collectively got exactly zero chill. I guess the FO also eliminated fan rooms, or put cameras in them. Poor bastards. )
> 
> Jesus, I’m making a fucking mess of this thing. I have a plan, I keep fucking around, and I can’t keep it together for anything I mean to do and I keep wandering off like a chipmunk with ADD on cocaine, and this year has been utterly insane. My anxiety is off the fucking rails. I have an eye twitch. It’s annoying.
> 
> Ps, I cannot take credit for having come up with the "he's not a superior officer, just a higher ranking one" line. That is almost verbatim from Down Periscope. Love that movie. It's hilarious.


	7. Kylo Ren & Maximilian Veers [Part 1] - x & 1, respectively

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The First Order, parties again, Veers, and Kylo Ren. Back when Kylo Ren first came to the FO, and Veers got out of the Army.
> 
> I swear I'm going somewhere with this parties theme.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Um.
> 
> Okay, I know. I said this wouldn’t involve main characters’ perspectives. And it will not, at least as far as touching very much on what's directly depicted in the movies. But this...er...it's background?
> 
> This scenario got into my head when I realized that Max and Kylo were alive at the same time and...and it wouldn't leave me alone and...
> 
> Then the Renperor happened. Haaaa. :'D
> 
> ***By the way, Kylo is like 16, and he’s still definitely a total Vader fanboy at the moment. This is not the same Kylo Ren as in TFA or TLJ, who, as we've all seen, has if not super. Kylo Ren is one of my favorite characters from the sequels. My intent is *not* to bash him, but as I've written him, I was going for...well...an impulsive kid in this fic.
> 
> And Max…well…he’s had a rough decade?
> 
> For some odd reason I feel like this scenario is the SW fandom equivalent of dividing by zero, putting Veers and Kylo Ren in the same frame. Like they occupy two completely separate valences, and they do not go together. I'm so sorry, I'm a fucking heretic.
> 
> LET'S DO THIS.

_17 years after the Battle of Endor…_

Kylo Ren’s heart raced under clammy skin. His presence, rather than provoking glances and whispers in the Force that stank of greed or _oh boy here’s Senator Organa’s boy again let’s hope he doesn’t make a scene this time_ , inspired curiosity from those around him, clear as a bell. Behind his mask, he was totally anonymous. Not that there was much chance that he could be recognized here anyway, but the mask made it a solid guarantee.

He hadn’t wanted to be known as Ben Solo, Senator Organa’s boy, perpetual kriff-up and galaxy-class embarrassment.

But Ben Solo had been a weak child. Fearful and full of unforgivable, inexcusable failings, crushed under the weight of the expectations piled on him. These had piled up until the disgrace of him became too much to put up with and he had been shipped away. His uncle tried to kill him, for fear of him.

Kylo Ren was no one, except whatever or whoever Kylo Ren was or would be.

He would utterly wipe Ben Solo out of existence. He no longer answered to the name. He, heir to the Skywalker bloodline, would become as powerful as his Grandfather, Darth Vader. _He would_. And he would not turn away from the path. He would not fail at the crucial moment, as Darth Vader had.

_With my Master’s help_. Snoke understood; Snoke had been there, offering encouragement, explaining the lies he’d been told. Telling him the truth. Guiding him.

Kylo waded into a sea of faces in the Academy’s parade grounds on Nall: greying Imperials and young First Order officers, wives and children, who turned to look at him while giving him a somewhat wary berth.

He could hear their thoughts around him in the Force, like ghosts in a mist. The questions they voiced, agitated, hushed, he felt before he heard, while their emotions moved and crested. Of their own volition, they made the obvious connection to the only other masked and shrouded figure they had ever heard of or known. It made Kylo almost giddy.

He could also feel dark veins of scorn or ridicule, hidden mutely behind marble faces. He stopped in his tracks, looking for whoever dared to make light of him. _First impressions are important_ , he could hear Leia Organa whisper in his ear.

“I see the Commandant even managed to find even a caped Sith Lord for his First Order. That is to his credit…I suppose. We’re a proper heir to the Empire, now!”

Kylo whirled and found himself staring back at a slender young man standing in a circle, who, when he saw Kylo was looking at him, lifted his chin and eyebrows.

“I meant no offense…my Lord,” he said calmly. Even so, Kylo could easily sense the thick undercurrent of condescension. He wouldn’t have even needed the Force, the man made practically no effort to hide it in his voice or in the smirk on his face. “It was merely an observation.”

“I’m not a Sith Lord,” Kylo blurted out. “I’m a Knight of Ren!”

“Well I must admit, to the uninitiated, one seems very like the other. What with the similarities in the…” The man waved his hand vaguely at his own clothing. “Ensemble.”

“It’s completely different!” Though it did give Kylo a rush to wear black robes and a mask in imitation of his Grandfather—being is believing—and that was how he got the idea, that wasn’t really its meaning. Darth Vader was confined to his suit as a result of wounds suffered on Mustafar at the hands of the Jedi traitor Obi-Wan Kenobi, _obviously_ ; Kylo’s own shrouds and mask, like his lightsaber, were based on the faces of ancient Force-wielders.

It was symbolism, _and it was_ _important_.

If the suit itself was meant to evoke Darth Vader, the shape was the outward reflection of the differences between how the Sith saw the Dark Side versus how the Knights of Ren saw the Dark Side. Their philosophies and teachings were nothing like each other. The Sith had become nothing but a shadow of the Jedi. That was why someone like Darth Tyranus could ever have claimed the title Sith Lord without ever fully embracing the Dark Side of the Force—the Sith were just the other side of an equally diminished coin.

The Knights of Ren, on the other hand, with Master Snoke’s guidance, reached back to an older, purer tradition. Less focused on the solemn contemplation of power…

More in being its raw conduit.

Kylo almost trembled. How dare this kriffing piece of bantha shit make light of him!

A faint smile curled at the edge of the man’s mouth and his eyes flicked to Kylo’s feet and then back to his face. “Then perhaps you might enlighten us? I admit, I understand so little of religious matters…”

Faces turned, hungry curiosity roiled around him, almost thick enough to cut.

_‘Religious’ matters?_ Kylo seethed. What would be the point, anyway? They’d never really understand no matter how much he tried to explain. The Force wasn’t some abstract imaginary friend invoked by a ritual, and it was insulting to suggest that it was. The Jedi acted like monks, but then they, too, had been wrong about the Force, and how it worked. But people who weren’t force sensitive just couldn’t ever really understand, right from the start. Not even the first thing. Han Solo never had.

“They’re just different,” he snapped imperiously, and started to turn to stalk away.

“No, no—Don’t leave. Please excuse me, I hadn’t meant to cause offense.”

Kylo could sense every ounce of patronization behind that innocent sneer.

And yet…

Kylo reminded himself that this was supposed to be his debut in the higher circles of the First Order’s ranking elite, and that first impressions were important. The aristocracy had been as important in the late Republic as they had been in the Empire, though the New Republic had tried to diminish the disproportionate power they held, with varying success. _As in all things_.

He needed to put his foot down with these people. Make a good impression. _Grandfather wouldn’t have put up with this kind of insolence. He inspired fear and respect. I am his grandson. His heir. I must live up to that_.

Even so he was made unsure by the man’s affected politesse. Ben Solo had never been very good at dealing with the two-faced politicians who came skulking around his heels at those parties his mother had dragged him to. He had tended to deal with their two-facedness with an only somewhat less than literal interpretation of a brick to the face, an outcome which always led to a great deal of trouble, embarrassment, and disappointment (and once, a formal, public apology by Senator Organa). And it always ended up his fault.

The thought made Kylo grimace inside his mask and him turn red, up to his ears.

_Stop thinking like Ben Solo. That name no longer has any meaning for you_.

But even though Kylo wanted to release his roiling anger onto something, exercise it as though it were a muscle—as he had been instructed to do—he found himself caught up short by the conversation. He _knew_ he was being baited, and he _knew_ there was a game here in which he had already stumbled, somehow. That was frustrating and he was _so angry_ , but Kylo was determined not to stumble any more—

He found himself standing there, awkwardly, staring back at this strange smirking man and wondering just what the kriff he even wanted.

“I am Evgen Karta,” the man said, folding one hand to lay flat across his stomach and turning the other hand slowly so that what little liquid was left in the snifter rolled around, towards himself. Then gestured to the woman standing next to him. “This is Alia Tarkin, and this…”

Kylo wasn’t going to remember the names of everyone in the circle; there were at least six of them and only two stood out, the first because he was the speaker, and the second because she was a Tarkin. She didn’t resemble her famous ancestor. She looked less like the embodiment of Imperial authority and more like an ordinary young woman. Lieutenant Hux, the General’s son (and a kriffing asshole), had told him that the Tarkins, aside from the Grand Moff, had only ever been a local power on remote Eriadu. Ever since half of the family had come to Nall after the end of the war, their importance had been overall magnified, mainly by association.

It was on the tip of Kylo’s tongue to give an old name—

“Kylo _Ren_ , eh? Of the Knights of _Ren?_ ” Karta asked, smiling at him with wide eyed innocence. “You haven’t named your order after yourself, have you?”

“The Knights of Ren are an ancient order, resurrected from time out of mind. The next time I see Supreme Leader Snoke, I’ll ask him about it for you.”

A profound silence fell over the group, and it spanned close to ten seconds.

“No, that…excuse me,” Karta said, grasping at straws as the color drained out of his face. He swallowed hard, his throat bobbed. “I…meant no offense, Lord Ren. Truly.”

“I am not a Sith Lord,” he declared. “The Sith were weak and corrupt, as much as the Jedi. The Emperor himself was proof of this.” Those in the circle shared tense glances; their Force presences reeked of uncertainty. Kylo relished the feeling, the knowledge that he had truth over theirs. It gave him a sense of sure power. “He delayed the dismantling of the Senate and the bureaucracy far too long because even he himself was fearful to tear the bandage away and let it heal. The Knights of Ren will not make the same mistake, and neither will the First Order. Together, we will act swiftly to bring order back to the galaxy.” Then he stood and waited for their reactions, almost quivering. Too much? Too little?

Karta stared at him for a rather long few seconds, and then gave a smile that was overall impressed, if a bit more guarded. “Well said, Lord Ren.”

Kylo could have fallen over in relief.

Alia Tarkin nodded along to Karta, then looked at Kylo. “We understand this is your first time on Nall, Lord Ren.”

“It is,” he replied.

“Welcome,” she said, bending her head very slightly, for a moment. “We are honored to have you with us.”

Kylo was searching for something appropriate to say to that when Karta perked up suddenly and raised his arm.

“ _Captain Veers!_ ”

A ripple went through the conversation circle, and even Kylo turned to look.

For a moment it didn’t process; Captain Veers simply didn’t compute. Not with that face, with its grey running to white hair. And it definitely hadn’t occurred to him that this could happen, or if there was even a small chance that it would.

_That’s General Veers_.

For a moment Kylo Ren stood there, frozen. _What is_ he _doing here? How is he here?_ Then his mind caught up with him and he chased away his surprise with a scowl, again glad for his hidden face. What was there to be surprised about? What did he think he would find when he came the First Order? Ex-Rebels? That was the kind of stupid lapse that made Ben Solo _weak_ , the kind of lapse that Grandfather would never have made—

But it wasn’t just the idea of _a face_ popping out of the history books, was it?—It was _that face_.

Ben Solo had heard stories all his life about the Rebellion, but one story had stood out in particular: his parent’s escape from Echo Base under a brutal ground assault. Even in the Republic, by turns, Veers was given a grudging sort of respect or an extreme hatred, because Hoth had been such an important battle to the Rebellion. Either way, he was one of the few Imperials to have some kind of identity in the Republic’s history books. Veers was huge, legendary—

And there he stood there in the flesh looking vaguely skeptical.

_He knew Grandfather. He served under Grandfather. He was loyal to Grandfather_.

Kylo tried not to make a sound or move, because if he did, he didn’t know what might come out. He strongly suspected something like the sound of air being let out of a tire.

_Tell—me_ — _EVERYTHING_ —he wanted to ask him a thousand questions—

“Won’t you join us, sir?” Karta called out.

Veers did, after a second’s hesitation. He stood there as Karta ran his mouth, introducing the other members of the group again, in sequence. Finally, Veers looked at Kylo. Kylo was surprised to find himself an inch or so shorter than the General when he was not used to looking up at anyone.

His Force presence was almost totally neutral, aside from a restlessness that seemed to have nothing to do with Kylo Ren at all, like a black thunderhead on a distant desert horizon. It was unique. While Kylo had sensed various shades of response swelling around him wherever he went all night, Veers just…looked at him, totally unaffected.

Kylo was instantly impressed.

_He was Grandfather’s ground forces commander; did you really think he wouldn’t be tough?_ —

Suddenly Kylo could no longer control himself and cut Karta off when he started to speak for Kylo.

“General Veers,” he said, maybe a _little_ too eagerly. “It is an honor to meet you.”

Kylo sensed a leviathan that, for the briefest moment, slithered up out of the depths before vanishing again. Outwardly Veers remained aloof, a picture of professional restraint.

“Thank you, but I retired as a Captain,” he said, his voice even, but firm.

Kylo was so kriffing grateful for his mask or his face would have been an open datapad. He wondered sometimes if he would ever get ahold of it.

“But…you are the Maximilian Veers who commanded the ground forces of the Death Squadron? Darth Vader’s personal squadron?”

“I am.”

“This is Kylo Ren,” piped in Karta cheerfully. “Our resident not-Sith Sith Lord. Dear old Brendol has outdone himself, I think.”

Veers’ hazel eyes flicked to Karta for a moment but there was no answer in them, though Kylo could sense his curiosity. He was more reserved than Kylo would have thought. Why was that? He’d always heard Veers was outspoken. Larger than life. The reality was…a lot more impenetrable. If Kylo was being really honest, that kind of iron self-assurance was flat out intimidating.

“He is a Knight of Ren. You wouldn’t be familiar with their order, would you? After having served under a Sith Lord…”

“Lord Vader did not discuss such things with his officer staff,” Veers replied. “I am not familiar with the Knights of Ren.”

“He insists they’re _different_ , although he’s neglected to tell us how. Do you use lightsabers in your order, Lord Ren, or is that the difference?”

Kylo tensed, his anger simmering. “We do. _I_ do. My Knights—”

“May we see it? I’ve always wanted to see a lightsaber. They’re so rare, especially these days.”

This Kylo was more than happy to do. He’d worked hard to create the tripartite blade, and even managed to more or less stabilize a cracked crystal, which was dangerous and rare. It was an _accomplishment_. It was something to be proud of and he wanted to see their faces.

Kylo reached for his saber that was clipped to his belt, and held it up. The blade came hissing and spitting from its casement, red flames licking the damp evening air in Zhell and casting a sanguine glow across the faces of his audience. Karta looked amazed; Tarkin held her drink close to herself and raised her eyebrows. Kylo could sense a faint reverberation of fear from her. Veers’ face barely moved, aside from the most minute twitch of his eyebrow. Beyond their circle, too, faces turned and all conversation went completely silent for several seconds as people twisted around to stare.

“Did you ever see Darth Vader’s sword, sir?” Tarkin asked, quietly. “How does it compare?”

“Never outside of engaged combat,” Veers replied. “Although it was also red, the blade was smooth and without crossbars. It was somewhat smaller.”

“Not…” She blinked, and her face twitched, mercurially. “Not even to dispense punishment?”

“Lord Vader preferred other methods, in such instances.”

Tarkin did not ask him to elaborate.

Maybe because Kylo was hyper-focused on him, Veers’ thoughts surfaced and sat on top like a film of oil. Memories of Imperial officers strangling to death on the bridges of Star Destroyers straight out of historical holonovels passed by, followed by a scene of Grandfather whirling in a cloud of sand and death and a flashing red saber. Kylo could sense Veers’ immense respect comingled with awe, but now that he had seen in, there was one emotion which struck home, no matter how singularly fixated upon that particular memory and whatever else Veers might be able to give him about his Grandfather he was: _irritation_. Specifically, at the scene in front of him, through the veil of Veers’ blank face. He thought the scene before him was a silly exhibition. He was impatient with it, this conversation. That subliminal agitation glided in and out of sense, again. There was something else there, too, just out of reach, but…

Immediately, Kylo felt like he’d been doused in ice water. He found himself ashamed. _Grandfather wouldn’t have shown off like this!_

He immediately switched off his lightsaber and put it back on its clip, and found himself utterly at a loss for what to say next. Kylo didn’t know if he wanted to apologize for his behavior or…

_Don’t hunch your shoulders!_

He felt like Ben Solo all over again. Like he had said or done something stupid that drew longsuffering looks out of those around him. That was _not_ what Kylo wanted out of this life. And he didn’t want to embarrass himself in front of someone who had known and respected Darth Vader. That felt almost like embarrassing himself in front of his Grandfather.

“Why did you _retire_ , anyway?” Karta asked cheerfully. “From what I understand it all happened very quickly. Very hush-hush. I always thought an old fossil like you wouldn’t want to retire at all. I imagine you’ll be bored. So—what happened?”

The silence was instantly thick enough to cut with a dull knife; even Tarkin shot a wide-eyed, head-tilted, appalled look at Karta, as if to say  _What is the matter with you!_

Karta snorted at their collective horror.

“Well, I’m only saying what everyone’s thinking! No sense ignoring the pink rancor in the room. Everyone’s talking about it. Where you can’t hear, of course. Well, either that or our very own Sith Lord. I’d just rather hear it from the only reliably accurate source there is.”

Veers’ expression could best be said to be just shy of absolute zero, and Kylo sensed an enormous bitterness, even as he started to reply.

“Have you had the chance to observe the AT-M6 prototypes, sir,” Tarkin interrupted. “I can think of no one else whose thoughts on their use in ground combat would be as welcome.”

Veers paused, and looked at Tarkin for a brief moment, narrowly.

“I have.”

“And…?”

“The AT-M6 would assume the role previously occupied by the Star Destroyer in orbital bombardment. Their use in battle allows the ground forces to be more operationally independent, but obligates a much narrower definition of the battlespace.” Confused stares were all the response he received, including from Kylo, but he had his mask on and no one could tell, thank the stars.

“What’s a battlespace?” Karta asked, sticking up his hand.

_At least I know what a battlespace is_ , Kylo thought smugly.

“Orbital bombardment allows an exponentially larger area to be hit in the event the target needs to be softened up,” Veers translated, a bit dryly. “Disproportionately overwhelming force has been the preferred tactic in combat since the Clone Wars, and the AT-M6 would not functionally change that. Overwhelming force grants the highest likelihood of victory while minimizing risk to personnel. The use of these walkers both narrows and widens the range of strategic possibilities at any given moment because while it frees up a Star Destroyer, it reduces destructive power available on the ground. While I understand that orbital bombardment is still a function of the Star Destroyers that are supposed to replace the ones we have left, it will not be one of their main mission roles. It seems to me that they are adding an extra and unnecessary step.”

Tarkin shrugged. “The First Order does not possess a fraction of the total resources the Empire did. We must be frugal, and if that means decentralizing our strategy…”

“I am not opposed to economy in strategy, Lady Tarkin,” Veers said pointedly. “I am, however, opposed to needless redundancy and an excess of specialization.”

Karta stirred. “Wait, hang on, isn’t that the opposite? Aren’t the things…you sound like you’re contradicting yourself.”

Veers did not feel that way, if Kylo was reading him right.

“How many models of walkers and ships is the First Order developing?” Veers asked, shortening patience in his tone and Force signature.

“Well—”

“The Empire had vast resources and used those vast resources to mass produce equipment and personnel capable of being used in a multitude of environments. Perhaps the individual application was not always perfect, but it got the job done. Since Jakku, we have had to repair the equipment we have with what we have left, and we could do that because the equipment was standardized. What we have managed to get recently is equipment perfectly suited to a particular environment, which becomes useless when taken outside of that context.”

“We hardly have the resources to replenish the ranks quite so quickly, so to speak,” Tarkin replied. “Could not this specialization be a symptom of a need for each individual to be as effective as possible in their role?”

“Yes. That’s the logic. But the loss of an individual under such circumstances is all the more serious. Once lost, they are lost until a replacement can be trained, and the system it was designed to support becomes structurally weaker.”

Tarkin seemed more pleased than anything else by that, which Kylo didn’t know how to read. Overall, she seemed more nervous than anything, in spite of her outward calm. “Ha! That is a vulnerability. We will just have to be good enough that this doesn’t happen.”

Veers didn’t say anything, he just seemed a little…His eyebrow might have twitched, and the conversation fell uncomfortably silent for a moment.

“That is exactly what the First Order intends to do,” Kylo exclaimed, drawing the gaze of everyone around him. “It isn’t necessary to be too big or too general. That was the flaw in the Empire. Too much bureaucracy, too much…too much. They weren’t good enough at what they did. That’s the whole idea behind the First Order. A small, but extremely effective and flexible force that dispenses with the need for something as bloated and inefficient as the Empire.”

Veers stiffened by a hair. He endured Kylo’s outburst, but Kylo could feel the man’s reaction in the Force. Even so, for whatever reason, Veers kept from arguing yet did not fix him with a pitying look, which was disconcerting to Kylo. It made him want to fix this. It made him hope that he could, that he hadn’t completely made a fool of himself.

“Not that I meant to say that it was _your_ failing—sir,” Kylo said quickly. “Actually, you are everything the First Order should aspire to be.”

That caught Veers completely off his guard, and he couldn’t quite stop the definite elastic contortion of his face and rise of both his eyebrows before they lowered again behind his professional phlegmatic look. The others in the conversation circle were visibly surprised as well, and even Karta was struck dumb a moment.

“Your assault on Hoth is a perfect example.”

Veers seemed to soften with some shade of amusement, and he scoffed. “As I recall, I received a reprimand from High General Tarrat for ignoring regulations—”

“That’s what I mean,” Kylo interrupted stridently. “You shouldn’t have received any kind of reprimand!”

“I thought you were given an award for that assault, sir,” Tarkin cut in, incredulous. “You were reprimanded?”

“Once it hit the holos. Until then, all Tarrat was concerned with was that I’d gone ahead and pressed the attack without waiting for the scout walkers to clear the shield wall first. I felt the risk incurred by delaying the attack and possibly allowing more rebels to escape was unacceptable. To do this I acted against standard regulations for ground combat.”

“What did you do with the reprimand?” Karta asked.

Kylo felt, again, that stab of sharp discontent, but it was difficult to piece out because he lacked context for why. Those thoughts lurked deep, and were well-controlled.

“It remained on my record,” he said. “It meant very little at the time.”

Karta lifted his head sharply, eyes bright with sudden understanding, and he grinned. “ _Oh_.”

Everyone else politely ignored this outburst, though Kylo was frustrated with too many questions with no answers that weren’t about what he wanted to hear.

“Supposedly, you didn’t leave any of the scum left alive,” Karta said.

Veers shook his head. “The goal of the assault was to eradicate the Rebellion once and for all. We had chased them off of worlds such as Yavin IV, Lothal, and Crait; we had no intention of allowing them to continue afterwards.”

“So you slaughtered all of them!” Faces turned sharply to Kylo Ren. “It was the correct thing to do. There is no place for mercy in these conflicts. By destroying the Rebellion root and stem, other planets would be less likely to rebel.”

* * *

 

*

Max continued to look at the masked figure and willed himself not to stare, trapped between a weird urge to laugh uncomfortably to dispel the tension, and a reluctance to give the impression of mockery. Even with the mask, he got the sense this Kylo Ren was young and a bit…awkwardly enthusiastic…and Max had a keen personal awareness of what kind of damage a Force user was capable of inflicting.

So he repeated the official line:

“The assault on Hoth was intended to completely obliterate the Rebellion, and was carried out with that task in mind.”

 “You mean you were trying to kill every Rebel you could find while you had the chance,” Kylo Ren pressed fervidly. “Admirable. I imagine you enjoyed it?”

There was a kind of crazy they called good to have on your side, and it existed in small numbers in all ranks at all times everywhere. Not something most civilians wanted to hear, but it existed all the same. For Max, personally, satisfaction came in knowing that a dead Rebel was one which could not menace the Empire. Someone had to do it, he was kriffing good at it, he loved his job, and it was the right thing to do. _Of course, now you’ve been blocked off from that_ …

“…As part of an overall strategic goal. If I enjoyed anything about it, it was the thought of ending a violent insurgency.” The Rebels were reactionaries and terrorists. There had been an element of restitution, naturally—they’d all had friends on the Death Star—but it certainly wasn’t the driving factor, at least not in his mind. He supposed that not even terrorists enjoyed the actual act of killing, in the main.

“But wasn’t it also because of the destruction of the Death Star? For revenge. I mean, the savagery of the attack on Echo Base. It was a deterrent for other systems.”

Talking to Kylo Ren was exhausting, Max decided. A constant struggle to back away for air.

“As I stated before, Lord Ren,” Max said, stiffly insistent on this if no other point, “I acted solely within the mandate of my orders to do what I believed to be the best interests of the Empire. Our goal was the destruction of the Rebellion against the Empire.”

“Of course!” Kylo Ren enthused. He was really starting to give Max whiplash. “I didn’t mean to criticize you, General. I meant the opposite.”

_I’m not sure he’s fully aware of what he means either._ Did Kylo Ren mean to extoll the act of killing itself, or…

“What orders did Darth Vader give you for Hoth?—I heard that Vader didn’t give very detailed orders, that he was notoriously vague,” Karta interrupted. “That he would leave his commanders to work out the details for themselves and kill them when they inevitably failed. Is that true?”

“Lord Vader expected his officers to operate without very much direct oversight, and gave considerable tactical autonomy to his commanders, but the overall mission goal was always very clear.”

“You could say that turnover was very high in the Death Squadron,” Karta snickered. “I heard the last Admiral of the Death Squadron got his job before the previous one had fully strangled to death. And _he_ had his position over Tagge’s corpse. I’ve heard it said that Vader’s insistence on results bred recklessness…Getting posted to the Death Squadron was just poor luck. Everyone with an ounce of sense or self-preservation did their level best to get out as quickly as possible.”

Max said tersely, “It was not a place for anyone who expected to sit around and do nothing while collecting a paycheck.” _Or for those who expected their careers to ride on their family name_.  His voice remained calm, but had become chilly and clipped. _How the kriff did I let myself get drawn into this situation? Arguing with children?_

“Darth Vader was the Emperor's pet Krayt dragon and served the same purpose with about the same level of sentience—” Karta stopped suddenly. His drink slipped from his hand and shattered at his feet. His mouth gaped open like a fish out of water, and his throat twitched as he clutched it to no effect.

“ _How **dare** you_ ,” Kylo Ren growled murderously, in that distorted voice. His hand was held out, fingers rigid, bent into a fleshless choke.

Karta finally seemed to realize he wasn’t somehow choking on air, and he looked at Kylo Ren with eyes rolled wide in terror. Meanwhile the scene had gotten the attention of those around them again, and conversation, again, went stone silent as a hundred wide eyes gaped unblinking.

“Lord Ren,” Tarkin began, quiet before her voice grew stronger as she went along. “Please. Evgen is harmless. An idiot, but harmless…forgive him…”

Ren ignored her as Karta began to turn red, and pawed at his throat. _He has maybe a minute left if he had a breath in him_. The clinical sureness with which Max was able to make that determination sent an unpleasant sense of déjà vu slithering up his spine.

“Darth Vader would have killed you for those words!” Ren hissed. “How dare you speak about him that way!”

Max grimaced. The entire scenario made him more than a little sick to his stomach.

Tarkin shifted her weight. “ _Please_ , Lord Ren—”

“That is enough,” Max commanded firmly. “Let him go.”

Ren hesitated. For a moment, Max thought he would be ignored too, or Ren would turn on him. He could feel his heart beat heavily in his chest under the cutting stare directed at him from behind that mask, but he refused to back down and stared right back. If he attacked Max, well…

_That would make a sad end to it, then, wouldn’t it? Get this far, and die at the hands of—this creature. Well, I stood eye-to-eye with Lord Vader. You’ll have to try harder._

And he did still have that concealed blaster strapped to his ankle.

Finally, Ren gave in like a child forced to give up a toy. Karta collapsed to his knees with a gasp. Max watched, mouth set in a grim, straight line. _Is this kind of behavior going to be the new standard?_

Karta struggled to his feet as Tarkin watched, and lifted a purpled, indignant face. When he opened his mouth Tarkin struck like a snake: she snagged his ear with her nails, and twisted. Karta squealed.

“Ev, that’s quite enough. I am not explaining to Aunt Lorne how you got yourself killed—my money isn’t on strangulation, or on a laser sword.” She turned a surprisingly frosty look on Kylo Ren, though her voice remained a silvery calm. _Well, there’s the family resemblance_. “Forgive him, Lord Ren. My cousin is very tired and has, unwisely, had far too much to drink tonight. He has a habit of provoking people he should not. I apologize for the offense he has given.” She gave a small, jerky nod, and stepped backwards. “Please excuse us. Good night.”

She hurried off, hauling Karta by the ear while he whimpered and complained.

The rest of the conversation circle took that opportunity to make fast excuses and bolt.

Max, too, had no reason to stick around, but was suddenly drawn up short when he was faced head-on by Kylo Ren as he began to pivot on his heel. Even with Max’s forgiving ideas on personal space, Ren was a little close. Max was not afraid of him, but he wasn’t interested in having a drawn-out conversation. Not tonight. Probably not ever—and after that little confrontation—

 “Why did you retire as a Captain?” Kylo Ren asked. “Darth Vader would not have been happy.”

Max wasn’t entirely…sure how to adequately address the second part so all he said was, “I was demoted shortly after Endor.”

“But why?”

Max stiffened again by just a hair. He wasn’t ashamed, just nettled, and even at the time it hadn’t altogether been unexpected. Ultimate responsibility for the loss of the shield generator had been his to bear, or else he was the only one still alive to bear it. If not for the timing and his experience, he might have been kicked out right then and there—the point was, it wasn’t a secret, and it was surprising that Ren didn’t know. He prepared to answer, then Kylo Ren barreled ahead without giving him a chance.

“I had no idea you had been demoted. Were you _on_ Jakku? I mean, for the battle?”

Max worked his jaw out of its clench as an unpleasant and endless but finite reel of memories rolled past his mind’s eye. The past would suck him in if he let himself linger there. Sometimes he could still taste metal on his tongue or feel the desert planet’s searing heat on the back of his neck. “Yes.”

“But you escaped from the planet.”

He could still remember gazing out a viewport at Jakku when they made high orbit, surrounded by the disintegrating graveyard of two battered fleets in a silent, suspended moment just before they made the jump to hyperspace. He and the rest of the survivors were trapped by the white noise in their heads, still consumed by the sheer magnitude of…everything, moving mechanically if at all—but not out of the woods yet. The bay was deathly quiet, he remembered that more clearly than anything else. Quieter than any bay he’d ever been in, even in the middle of night shift, and shockingly cold after the Jakku heat. _The Empire, come to this_. It seemed so…

Then in the next second, they made the jump, and that was it. That was the end of everything that had been, for Maximilian Veers. He had let himself turn and lean back against the bulkhead, slide to the deck, stretch his legs out, unstrap and pull off his headgear—dimly aware that sitting on the deck was completely against regulations, even though everyone was sitting—only to discover he was too kriffing tired to cry. For the life of him, he didn’t remember much for a while after that.

“Evidently.” He was aware that he had allowed much in the way of aggravation to surface in his tone, but he was _not_ going to allow himself to be interrogated for entertainment, not by anyone.

“Wasn’t the 501st left behind on Jakku? Darth Vader’s Stormtrooper battalion?”

_Were they? I’d forgotten_. Maybe he’d just put it out of his mind. It didn’t inspire good feelings, and he’d been busy for the last decade.

“As I recall. Excuse me, Lord Ren.” He didn’t wait for a response, he just walked away. He could feel Ren staring after him.

The Major (Max had never known his name or where he was from; lines had broken and reformed and everyone’s units had collapsed into chaos by the end, dirtside) that had been the surviving ranking officer, in making the decision on who would retreat and who would stay, looked between Veers and another Captain who was just as bloody and sooty and tired (he had to have been even younger than Tarkin, who couldn’t have been more than twenty-five), and decided that the Hero of Hoth would be worth more in the wars to come. The Major himself had then stayed, when some had used their authority to slip away.

And now…

Now.

It was an insult. It _enraged_ him. It hit him with full force, and he began to walk faster, through faces which turned to him, and sometimes called out. He passed them by with a nod or something short which he did not remember afterwards.

On the surface, he’d retired with full honors, befitting a career that had spanned decades and included one of the most spectacular victories ever scored against the Rebellion.

That didn’t stop it from feeling hollow.

From _being_ hollow. He’d managed to achieve the mission aim on Gadril against all odds, but he’d done it in such a way that led his superiors to claim that it was his refusal to follow tactical commands from above that led to massive casualties and the loss of four scout walkers. The reality was that Max had salvaged a suicide mission from the curse of idiots in charge making poor decisions from high orbit by the skin of his teeth, but if he hadn’t missed his guess, he’d sealed his fate when, tired beyond reason and dragged in to account for himself the second he stepped foot back in the hangar bay, he actually pointed out the various reasons why the original plan had been bad from inception while the man whose job it was to make the plan was sitting on a disciplinary review board in front of him.

Admiral Kuranotte quietly had him relieved, and offered him choice of being put in a desk job until he chose to retire in his own time, or retiring.

So here he was.

Part of him was vaguely aware that he was in no mood to be here, he was too pent-up and preoccupied, but then he’d been sitting around for a week and he’d thought maybe it would be good for him. Max hadn’t been made for sitting still. He had always needed to be _doing_ something.

When he sat still, he got restless, and if he got restless…

Even reduced to a Captain, and commanding his one walker, he’d been responsible for his entire battalion’s material upkeep, a job normally held by at least a Major in a staff position andmade no easier or less time consuming for the fact that they couldn’t get any new parts in an almost continuous warzone. Equipment failed, armor cracked. They made it work.

When he’d just come out of the Academy as a junior officer all those years ago, he’d been sure senior officers spent all their time sitting behind their fancy desks twiddling their thumbs during the many hours they weren’t giving speeches that were far too long and that no one actually listened to (Max still wasn’t convinced that wasn’t exactly what Academy Commandants, in particular, actually did). As he rose higher, and especially after his wife’s death, when he sank himself into the army, the many tasks he already had were joined by an ever-multiplying series of inspections, exercises, meetings, and decisions—and yes, the odd speech, which turned out to be almost like a break from his long list of duties—until the idea of was more of a dream that had to be aggressively enjoyed on the rare occasions he took leave. There was always something to do or look ahead towards.

The point was Max liked busy, it suited him. He throve under pressure.

But here, he was surrounded by socialites and children whose solution was to _try better_ , and now, apparently, there was an ersatz Lord Vader—

He had the sense that coming tonight had been a mistake. He was in no state to deal with this crowd and his encounter with this Kylo Ren had put a bad taste in his mouth. As irritating as Karta had been, he had been no more than that—irritating, like a fly buzzing in the cab.

And if that was a sign of what was to come— _petty violence and sneering catfights_ —

Max kept walking through the crowd, headed towards the Academy building.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> End part 1; I wanted to cut this off here, because as a split perspective this is getting very long. I hope I can get part 2 finished sometime in the next century lol--and because in the second part there's a shift, and it will be mostly from the perspective of Max.
> 
> (Having written this, I’m kind of interested in what might happen if Max somehow gets dragged into the shitshow of Supreme (Fanboy) Leader Kyo Ren vs. General-wishes-he-were-Grand-Marshall Hux who has a tendency to murder anyone in his way. I don't think Max would uh...have much patience.)
> 
> With all this FO material I feel like I should write some former Rebel/current Resistance/Republic-territory themed pieces somewhere, for balance. I'm still annoyed about how handwaved the politics are in the sequels. Maybe Canto Bight and those themes I liked so well but I felt were poorly executed? Like, I thought that was what the opening crawls were for? If TLJ opens like 5 seconds after TFA, we don’t need a fucking reminder of what happened. We could have used a “the wider galaxy has rapidly fragmented due to a lack of cohesiveness and the general loss of institutional inertia which was propagated solely by the Hosnian System's government/planetary governments are assholes/ewoks have conquered coruscant/SOMEthiNG JUST SOMETHING PLEASE and so the FO reigns supreme.” But no. We just get “the FO reigns supreme.”

**Author's Note:**

> Note that Armitage Hux isn’t mentioned once. Well, do you think that’s an accident? It ain’t. But since this is a series of fics, dear charming Brendol will be returning at some point. Stay tuned.
> 
> I’ve never read any Star Wars books except for the Han Solo trilogy that’s going the way of the dodo as far as canon is concerned (how fucking dare you Bria Tharen is bae those fucking books made my late 1990’s), but I totally read an article about Snoke and I looked at Wookipedia again, so…yeah actually the Commandant’s Cadets are a real thing in canon. Who fucking knew.
> 
> Ps renascence is a word and yes, it’s an alternate word for renaissance, but renaissance is French and generally used to at least invoke the time period…I’ll shut the fuck up the linguist in me is showing. Renascence has a slightly different meaning. I may or may not have written this fic solely to use renascence. Meh.
> 
> These fics may be long or short, and are produced when I can think of something to write. Clearly, I hate myself or something, but this is going to be a long-ass summer, my coursework is relatively not time consuming, and apparently this means I've been hit with the inspiration bug for writing about the First Order. Lord have mercy. I need entertainment because I can’t afford a plane ticket to go anywhere. I may go to Canada though; I’ve never been to Quebec and I haven’t been to Canada in years. Quebec City looks fucking amazeballs.
> 
> I also have like three chapters of this already written, they’re all one-shots from different people's perspectives, so…just need to edit the next couple.


End file.
